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B. T. Pridemix] [Frontispiece 

DAWN ON THE CHIENTANG RIVER, CHEKIANG. 

" The moving homes of men whose lives are as the lives of their 
forefathers." 



CHINA 
JAPAN AND KOREA 



BY 



J. O. p. BLAND 



ILLUSfRAfED 



NEW YORK 

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 

1921 







The Author and Publishers desire to 
express their thanks to Mr. B. T. Prideaux, 
of Shanghai, for allowing them to use his 
beautiful photographs in the illustrations 
of this book. 



h 



Printed in Great Britain. 



The very idea of the power and the right of the 
people to establish government presupposes the duty 
of every individiuil to obey the established govern- 
ment. All obstructions to the execution of the laws, 
all combinations and associations, under whatever 
plausible character, with the real design to direct, 
control, counteract or awe the regular deliberation 
and action of the constituted authorities, are 
destructive of this fundamental principle, and of 
fatal tendency. They serve to organise faction, to 
give it an artificial and extraordinary force ; to put, 
in the place of the delegated will of the nation, the 
will of a party, often a small but artful and enter- 
prising minority of the community. . . . However 
combinations or associations of the above description 
may now and then answer popular ends, they are 
likely, in the course of time and things, to become 
potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious and 
unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the 
power of the people and to usurp for themselves 
the reins of government, destroying afterward the 
very engines which have lifted them to unjust 
dominion. — From Washington's Farewell Address. 



CONTENTS 



PART I 
A POLITICAL SURVEY 

CHAP. 

I. INTRODUCTORY .... 

II. YUAN SHIH-k'aI, 1912-16 . 

III. CHINA JOINS IN THE WORLD WAR 

IV. THE REPUBLIC OF TO-DAY . 

V. CIVIL WAR AS A PROFESSION - . 

VI. china: the problem of reconstruction 

VII. JAPAN : her vital problem 

VIII. japan's policy IN CHINA . 

IX. the japan of to-day 

X. THE INDEPENDENCE MOVEMENT IN KOREA 



PAGS 

I 

29 

52 

68 
89 
113 
135 
156 
176 
192 



PART II 
STUDIES AND IMPRESSIONS 
XI. ON A JAPANESE PACIFIC LINER 
XII. VMODERN TOKYO 
XIII. AT A JAPANESE THEATRE . 
XIV<./A DAY IN SEOUL 
XV. (^SHANGHAI 

XVI. NORTHWARD THROUGH SHANTUNG 
XVII. ^PEKING IN 1920 
XVIII. AN EMPEROR IN WAITING . 
XIX. THREE PALACES 

INDEX .... 



209 
220 
230 
240 

245 
267 
278 

295 
309 
323 



vn 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 



DAWN ON THE CHIENTANG RIVER . 

WISDOM IN THE ROUGH ^ 

VERY BUSY j 

CHINA : THE ETERNAL PROBLEM 

BREADWINNERS .... 

A CHINESE GARDEN 

A BUDDHIST PRIEST 

ASCENDING THE RAPIDS, HWEI RIVER "j 

A FISHERMAN ON THE WHANGPOO j 

UNMARRIED GIRLS O.F THE MIDDLE CLASS, SHANGHAI 

SUNSET ON THE HWEI RIVER .... 

A VILLAGE ON THE CHIENTANG RIVER . 

A WAYSIDE SHRINE .... 

" SHE DWELT AMONG THE UNTRODDEN WAYS 

HOMEWARD AT EVENING 

THINGS ANCIENT AND MODERN .... 

" THOSE THAT DIG AND WEAVE, THAT PLANT AND BUILD 

"JUST A SONG AT TWILIGHT" 

SCENE IN THE THEATRE QUARTER, KYOTO "j 

THE PALACE MOAT, TOKYO j 

FUJIYAMA THE PEERLESS ..... 

A JUNK ON THE WHANGPOO "j 

BOAT TRAFFIC, SOOCHOW CREEK, SHANGHAlj 

THE RICE HARVEST, JAPAN "j 

PRIMITIVE TRANSPORT, JAPAnJ 

A KOREAN FAMILY IN WINTER COSTUME "I 

CORNER OF THE AUDIENCE HALL, SEOUlJ 



To /ace page 
Frontispiece 



I ■ 



26 
30 
38 
56 

66 

82 
90 

100 
108 

116 

126 

132 

144 
160 

17s 

18s 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 



To face ^age 
. 212 



ON BOARD A JAPANESE LINER I WRESTLING j 

THE MOATED WALLS OF CHIYODA PALACE^ TOKYoJ 

UTAYEMON AND FUKUSUKE ..... 

THEATRE STREET IN KYOTO ..... 

IN THE OLD PALACE ENCLOSURE^ SEOUL. ] 

KOREAN GIRLS AT A JAPANESE SCHOOL^ SEOULj 

A QUAINT LITTLE MONSTER^ SHANGHAI "k 

[ . . . .248 

MODES AND FASHIONS, SHANGHAI J 

YOUNG china: MARRIAGE UP TO DATE^I 

A LADY OF FASHION, SHANGHAI j 

MILITARISM IN THE MAKING ) 

Y 264 

THE FEMALE OF THE SPECIESj 

GENERAL MA LIANG's TROOPS AT DRILL] 

ANCESTOR WORSHIP J 

CAMELS RESTING, PEKING "j 

A CAMEL TRAIN FROM THE WESTERN HILLS, PEKINoJ 

MILLET IN OCTOBER \ 

ON THE FROZEN PEIHO, TIENTSInJ 

THE NORTHERN RAILWAY APPROACH TO PEKING l 

UNDER THE WALLS OF PEKING j 

A LLAMA RITUAL, PEKING "i 

IN THE MANCHU QUARTER, PEKINGJ 

ENTRANCE TO A TAJEN'S RESIDENCE, PEKING^I 

IN THE ONCE-FORBIDDEN CITY, PEKING j 



230 
236 

240 



258 



272 
282 
290 

306 
312 



CHAPTER I 

INTRODUCTORY 

In a book published at the end of 1912,^ the year of 
the abdication of the Manchu dynasty and the estabhsh- 
ment of the Chinese RepubHc, I endeavoured to trace 
the causes, and to predict some of the results, of that 
upheaval. Before proceeding to discuss the history of 
the eight years which have elapsed since that book was 
written, I propose to revert briefly to some of the views 
which it expressed and to some of the opinions which it 
evoked, in China and abroad. Eight years are all too 
brief a space of time in the life of a nation to afford any 
conclusive evidence as to the direction of its political 
evolution; nevertheless, the course of events since 19 12, 
and the actual position of affairs at Peking and in the 
provinces afford, I think, good ground for certain useful 
conclusions in regard to questions upon which opinion has 
widely differed, and still differs, in England and America. 

Of these, the most important is, firstly, the general 
question of the fitness of the Chinese people for self- 
government ; and, secondly, the question of Young China's 
aspirations and achievements in the organisation and 
working of representative institutions. 

I do not propose to recapitulate here the causes of the 
Chinese revolution of 1911-12 ; the truth is now generally 
recognised, I believe, that these causes were funda- 
mentally economic rather than political, and that, until 
the social s^^stem of the Chinese people shall have been 
modified by process of education, the acute pressure of 
population upon means of subsistence, which results 

1 Recent Events and Present Policies in China, 
6 



2 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

from that system, must continue to be an ever-recurring 
source of unrest and strife. It is also generally recognised 
that under these conditions, no matter what names and 
shapes authority may assume, the Chinese can never 
hope to be quietly and orderly governed, unless and 
until the Central Government is strong enough to keep 
in check, by force, the ever-latent elements of disorder. 
All over the world, and most noticeably since the War, 
men are being led to perceive that the increasing pressure 
of population upon the food resources of the planet, 
constitutes civilisation's gravest problem and the para- 
mount cause 9f world unrest. In China, the social 
fabric is, comparatively speaking, so simple, that the 
connection between cause and effect is swift and un- 
mistakable when pestilence or famine decimate whole 
provinces. A few observers there are who, while ad- 
mitting the severity of the economic pressure which has 
made Chinese history for centuries a series of cataclysms, 
still profess to believe that it may be relieved by ex- 
pedients, such as emigration, the scientific development 
of mines, or the improvement of agriculture. But, 
generally speaking, the truth appears to be realised that, 
even if it were possible to obtain temporary allevia- 
tion by any or all of these means, the fundamental problem 
would still remain unsolved, the application of the law 
of population being merely deferred, and its results 
aggravated, by such expedients, unless accompanied by 
a reduction of the birth-rate. 

The views which I ventured to put forward in 1913 
concerning the permanent causes of unrest, and incident- 
ally of the revolution, in China, naturally appealed with 
greater force to Europeans there resident than to ob- 
servers and students of Chinese affairs at a distance. 
Many of the latter, unfortunately, are by temperament 
or vocation disposed to believe in the efficacy of political 
formulae or religious beliefs to relieve society of the 
penalties of its collective ignorance or collective folly, 
and attach small importance to economics. For a certain 



INTRODUCTORY 3 

very prevalent class of rhapsodists and idealists, the 
experience of a thousand yesterdays is always as nought 
compared with to-morrow's vision of the Promised 
Land. Show them, by weight of indisputable evidence 
gathered from trustworthy sources, that in the East no 
magic virtue of regeneration proceeds from the blessed 
words " Democracy " and " Republic," prove to them 
that the so-called Parliamentarians have reduced the 
political status of China to the level of San Domingo, 
they will denounce you as a reactionary, urge you to 
have more faith, and proceed to proclaim with increased 
fervour the application of their infallible panaceas. 

Writing in 1912, while the Republic was still in the 
making, I observed that no stable form of government 
could possibly be evolved from the materials at Young 
China's disposal. The reasons for this belief were given, 
as follows : — 

" Remembering the ancestry and genesis of Young 
China, being personally acquainted with many of its 
leading spirits, having followed its operations and activities 
in every province from the beginning of the present 
revolution, I am compelled to the conviction that salva- 
tion from this quarter is impossible, not only because 
Young China itself is unregenerate and undisciplined, 
but because its ideals and projects of government involve 
the creation of a new social and political structure utterly 
unsuited to the character and traditions of the race; 
because it is contrary to all experience that a people cut 
off from its deep-rooted beliefs and habits of life should 
develop and retain a vigorous national consciousness." 

Another passage summarised the actual position created 
by the collapse of the Manchu Government's authority, 
as follows : — 

" The army, uncontrolled and uncontrollable, has 
already repudiated Young China; the horde of hungry 
pohticians remains absorbed in futile arguments and 
sordid intrigues; the Government is without prestige, 
policy or power; three parties in the State, ahke 



4 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

forgetful of their country's urgent needs, struggle for place 
and pelf; the Cabinet is distracted by the advice of 
amateur politicians at the capital and the threats and 
protests of the provinces." 

These opinions were naturally denounced with great 
vehemence by Young China in the vernacular Press, and 
challenged by more than one vocational optimist amongst 
the foreign advisers of the Chinese Government. They 
were also freely criticised by certain writers, notably in 
America, who had discovered, in Sun Yat-sen and his 
ready-made Republic, Heaven-sent proof of the saving 
grace of democratic principles. The Daily News, for 
example, quoted with approval the opinion of a well- 
known Oriental scholar, who, writing from Peking in 
November 1912, said : — 

" The influence of men like Sun Yat-sen and Huang 
Hsing has tended to effect a rapprochement between the 
Nationalists and President Yuan Shih-k'ai, to the great 
improvement of the situation. The position here has 
improved to an extraordinary extent." 

- A month later the Christian Science Monitor of Boston, 
U.S.A., severely criticising my views, gave a glowing 
account of the preparations which it seriously believed 
were then a-foot in China for " the elections for the first 
National Parliament." Its picture of political activities 
under the Republic is worth reproducing, not only because 
of its earnest absurdity, but because, in spite of all that has 
since happened, the same sort of nonsense is still being 
written by the incurable theorists who insist that the 
East is bound to derive moral and material benefits from 
adopting the political institutions of the West. 
Wrote the Editor of the Monitor : — 

" Sharply contrasted with the pessimistic predictions 
of Mr. Bland, whilom representative of the London Times 
in Peking, now giving a series of lectures at the Lowell 
Institute in Boston, are the hopeful comments of the 
Chinese Press and public men on the course of events 



INTRODUCTORY 5 

during the first year of the Republic. . . . Unless our 
sources of information are much distorted, the twelve- 
month has disclosed both Sun Yat-sen and Yuan Shih- 
k'ai as large enough to subordinate themselves and their 
ambitions to performing genuine national duties, one 
as a peripatetic teacher of racial unity throughout the 
provinces, and the other as provisional President, hand- 
ling diverse domestic and international problems with 
sagacity and patience. No mere novices or doctrinaires 
are in power at Peking, as Mr. Bland would have the 
American public believe. . . . Evidently they err who 
think the Chinese ill-adapted to deal with principles 
and methods of government. The papers of State issued 
at Peking to-day not only lack most of the former ornate- 
ness of phrasing and absurdity of excuse for official lapses 
which often used to make the Imperial Decrees as ludicrous 
as they were cruel ; these papers are now straightforward, 
logical, and impressive in their vital dealings with concrete 
needs of the people." 

Many visions of the new Chinese Arcadia were vouch- 
safed at this period. Here is one proclaimed by Mr. Hua 
Chuen-mei, Secretary of the China Society of America, 
in an article published by the New York Tribune in 
January 1913 : — 

" Since the establishment of the Republic, all the 
officials of the country have been fulfilling their adminis- 
trative and judicial functions, and commerce and in- 
dustry have been resumed with added eagerness and 
enterprise. Every branch of civil life has been, or is 
being, reconstituted or modified to accord with the new 
national spirit. The people as a whole are content and 
pleased with the Government they have ordained, because 
even in the short space of a twelvemonth, that Govern- 
ment has demonstrated its honesty, its efiiciency, and its 
loyalty to the national ideals. . . . 

" In the fall of 191 1, when the revolutionary armies 
in the Yangtsze Valley raised the standard of republicanism 
as against monarchism, China had found herself. The 
enthusiasm for popular sovereignty spread like wild 
prairie fire. The eighteen mutually jealous provinces 
under the Manchu regime now ceased to be divided. 



6 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

The movement for a series of independent States was 
promptly thrown overboard, and the people of all China 
eagerly and without coercion fell into line, first to oust the 
Manchu, then to establish representative Government. . . . 
"... The people of China had spoken loud and un- 
mistakably in favour of the democratic principle of 
Government. Besides, the form of republicanism, long 
ago communicated by American merchants and mission- 
aries and by the Chinese students educated in American 
institutions of learning, had already universally infected 
the people, and as the years passed, the symptoms of a 
wider consciousness of popular rights developed into a 
veritable contagious disease for national freedom and 
enfranchisement . ' ' 

I have quoted the above, not only because of its 
melancholy retrospective interest, but because it is typical 
of the windy ullage with which the Young China of 
Western learning still regales its admirers abroad ; typical 
of the kind of bread which returns to us, after many 
days, cast by the hand of error upon the waters of 
delusion.^ 

It is only fair to say that public opinion abroad during 
the first years of the Republic was powerfully influenced 
by the consistently optimistic views of the late Dr. 
Morrison, the famous Times correspondent, who became 
an adviser to the Chinese Government in 1912. Dr. 
Morrison's sympathies were instinctively with the foreign- 
educated section of Young China, and in spite of many 
disillusions, he clung to his genial belief that it would 
eventually produce leaders imbued with disinterested 
patriotism and constructive statesmanship. His in- 
domitable optimism and loyalty to those whom he served, 
led him to turn a tolerant, not to say a blind eye, to the 
seamy side of Chinese politics, and to emphasise their 
bright spots. Thus in the winter of 1912, his views on 

1 Dr. Wellington Koo, lately Chinese Minister at Washington, 
put it even more artistically, when he said, " In reconstructing 
her government on the principle of sovereignty vested in the 
people as a body, China has thrown autocracy overboard and is 
putting her house in order under the aegis of democracy." 



INTRODUCTORY 7 

the situation, published as an interview in the Pall Mall 
Gazette, and circulated broadcast, were of a nature to 
encourage confidence in the future, if only because of 
the worthy doctor's world-wide reputation. As the 
Spectator observed : — 

" Dr. Morrison's vision of China is radiant. Trade 
has reached a record; the soldiers who used to prey 
upon the country when dismissed penniless from the 
army, now receive their pay and become quiet and use- 
ful citizens; no one desires the return of the Manchus, 
because every one knows the difference between gross 
rapacity and a sincere attempt to govern decently ; daily 
newspapers and cheaper telegrams carry enhghtenment 
throughout the land, the Christian calendar has been 
officially adopted, and Sunday is recognised as a day of 
rest; and oil, by the genial light of which newspapers 
can be read in the long, dark evenings, has brought a 
moral illumination into the hves of the people, since they 
are no longer driven to the solacing distraction of opium." 

It is also necessary to remember, in judging these 
opinions retrospectively, that political economy is|a 
dreary science ; that there is no delusion so prevalent as 
belief in the miracle of a nation re-born and structurally 
changed by means of a revolution; and that the en- 
thusiasms born of that belief are always keen and con- 
tagious. He who, moved by the emotion of such enthusi- 
asm, discerns the splendid dawn of a new era, may|be 
absolved if his vision is surcharged with couleur de rose. 
But when the dream- castles of that dawn have vanished 
in the clear light of day, a heavy responsibility rests with 
those who, either as zealots or as optimists de metier, 
continue to proclaim their solid virtues. 

During the first two years of the Republic, the British 
Press as a whole shared the prevalent enthusiasm for the 
new era, to the extent that it was generally prepared to 
suspend its verdict as to the merits and capacity of 
Young China, and to judge the tree by its fruits. As a 
reviewer in the Spectator put it (December 7, 1912) : — 



8 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

"If it were safe to surrender oneself entirely to the 
voice of authority in judging of Chinese affairs to-day, 
we should be guided unhesitatingly by Mr. Bland. But 
just now authority speaks with a divided voice. There 
is Dr. Morrison, for instance, who is as confident about 
the future of China as Mr. Bland is doubtful. Professor 
Reinsch ^ also inclines to the side of the optimists." 

At the same time, the English Press, better informed 
concerning foreign affairs than the majority of American 
papers, was never greatly impressed by the eloquence 
of Dr. Sun Yat-sen, and by many it was felt that a grave 
responsibility was incurred by those missionaries and 
other well-meaning enthusiasts who had advised and 
encouraged Young China to believe, or at least to pro- 
claim, that the solution of their country's dangers 
and difficulties was to be found in the adoption of a 
Republican form of Government. Thus, speaking of 
Sun Yat-sen, the Observer said (December 8, 1912) ; — 

" To the support which the outer world gave to this 
unpractical theoriser, are due the facts that the Chinese 
Republic stands upon a base of sand, that the moderate 
men are looking forward to the re-establishment of a 
monarchy, the army to a military despotism or extended 
anarchy, the provinces to autonomy, and the robber 
Powers around China to spoliation on a scale even bigger 
than has hitherto been possible. Young China's friends 
have served the honest members of the party badly, by 
persuading Europe and America to accept as genuine 
the elaborate sham which has been erected, by talking 
of the solidity of the Republic and the acquiescence of 
the people," 

In a special review of " Recent Events and Present 
Policies in China," published in the Nineteenth Century 
for May 1913, Earl Cromer observed : — 

" We English are largely responsible for creating the 
frame of mind which is even now luring Young Turks, 

1 Formerly American Minister at Peking; now financial 
adviser to the Chinese Government in New York. 



INTRODUCTORY 9 

Chinamen, and other Easterns into the political wilder- 
ness by the display of false signals. We have, indeed, 
our Blands in China, our Milners in Egypt, our Miss 
Durhams in the Balkan Peninsula, and our Miss Bells 
in Mesopotamia, who wander far a-field, gleaning valuable 
facts and laying before their countrymen conclusions 
based on acquired knowledge and wide experience. But 
their efforts are only partially successful. They are often 
shivered on the solid rock of preconceived prejudice and 
genuine but ill-informed sentimentalism. A large section 
of the English public are, in fact, singularly wanting in 
political imagination. Although they would not, in so 
many words, admit the truth of the statement, they 
none the less act and speak as if sound national develop- 
ment in whatsoever quarter of the world, must of neces- 
sity proceed along their own conventional, insular, and 
time-honoured lines, and along those lines alone." 

A little later Earl Cromer wrote to me : — 
" I am very glad you liked my paper in the Nineteenth 
Century ; it represents my sincere convictions. Although 
I do not possess any local knowledge of Chinese 
affairs, I have very little doubt that your forecast 
will turn out to be correct, only, as not infrequently 
happens with prophets, you will very likely have to 
wait some while before your prophecies are fulfilled. As 
a rule, people who see clearly into a general situation 
are rather apt to under-rate the time required for political 
evolution. The locus classicus on this subject is the 
case of De Tocqueville, who, in the very early days, cast 
an extraordinarily accurate horoscope of the course which 
would be run by the Second Empire, but it took seventeen 
years before events proved how correct he had been," 

When Earl Cromer wrote of the " genuine but ill- 
informed sentimentalism" which had led certain classes 
of Englishmen to sow seeds of unrest amongst Oriental 
peoples, he was judging from the results of his own 
experience and observation in the Near East. In China, 
our faddists, fanatics, and intellectual Bolsheviks have, 
no doubt, done their bit, but on the whole the influences 
which have created the most mischief, by breeding a 
spirit of indiscipline and sedition among the younger 



10 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

generation of literati, and by encouraging political alarms 
and excursions in the name of democracy, have been 
more American than English. It is worthy of note in 
this connection that, now that the chickens of this par- 
ticular error are coming home to roost, it is from the 
same intellectual sources that emanate the latest warn- 
ings of the Yellow Peril, the American Vision of Pan- 
Asia, " welded into a common solidarity of feeling against 
the Dominant White Man," of the white race swamped 
in " the rising tide of colour," and civilisation wiped out 
" by the imperious urge of the coloured world towards 
racial expansion ! " ^ Thus, at the present moment, 
while one group of well-meaning enthusiasts is fervently 
advocating the abolition of the foreigner's extra-territorial 
rights in China, as a matter of abstract justice, another 
group of equally sympathetic advisers sees no remedy 
for the existing chaos but the application of strict foreign 
supervision, not only to China's finances, but to her 
internal political machinery ! ^ 

1 would ask the reader to believe that, in thus referring 
to the part played by foreign sympathisers and advisers 
during the period immediately following the Revolution, 
I have no wish to flourish the prophet's mantle, or to 
drag coat-tails of complacency. My purpose in traversing 
this old ground is two-fold. Firstly, to emphasise the 
fact that those who have encouraged the Western-learning 
" Intellectuals " of Young China to apply their ill- 
digested text-book theories to the business of govern- 
ment, have incurred serious responsibility and wrought 
much mischief. (It must, I think, be admitted that if 
the disastrous experiments of Dr. Sun Yat-sen and his 
followers had not been supported by Europeans on the 
spot, and by the sympathy of public opinion abroad, 
their career would have been brief. Yuan Shih-k'ai 

* Vide The Rising Tide of Colour, by Lothrop Stoddard. 
Scribners. 

2 Vide Modern Constitutional Development in China, by Harold 
M. Vinacke. Princetown University Press. 



INTRODUCTORY 11 

would have succeeded in restoring something Hke law 
and order, and the present chaos of strife and corruption 
would have been to a great extent averted.) Secondly, 
I desire to show that, notwithstanding the parlous results 
achieved by Young China's politicians in the name of 
Democracy, there is still a tendency, in certain quarters 
(especially where " moral uplift " is combined with a 
shrewd business instinct), to apply the old couleur de rose 
and to create a very misleading impression abroad as to 
the actual condition of affairs in the Far East, thus 
encouraging the self-constituted rulers of China in the 
belief that responsible opinion in America and Europe 
sympathises with their theories, and sanctions their 
practices, of government. 

I have spoken of the optimist de metier. I know of no 
more striking example of the pernicious nonsense with 
which Young China has been fed and misled, than " the 
semi-official statement of China's case to the world," 
published by Mr. Putnam Weale in 1918, under the 
title The Fight for the Republic in China. When this 
book was written, the northern Military Party, subsi- 
dised by Japan, had just succeeded in defeating General 
Chang Hsiin's attempt to restore the Monarchy and his 
own fortunes, and in the collapse of this farcical coup 
d'etat, Mr. Weale found welcome proof of the devotion 
of the Anfu faction to the principles of enlightened 
Liberalism. Once again, whilst lawlessness stalked red- 
handed through the plundered land, and proofs multiplied 
on every hand that the so-called dem.ocracy had become 
more flagrantly venal than ever before, he descried the 
dawn of a new era, in which the world would " welcome 
China to the family of nations, not only on terms of 
equality, but as a representative of Liberalism and a 
subscriber to all those sanctions on which the civilisation 
of peace rests." He predicted that " within a limited 
period, Parliamentary Government would be more suc- 
cessful in China than in some European countries," and 
" something very similar to the Anglo-Saxon theory of 



12 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

Government impregnably entrenched in Peking." In 
his opinion, " the marvellous revolution of 1911 had 
given back to this ancient race its old position of leader 
of ideas on the shores of the Yellow Sea." Finally, he 
expressed the confident belief, " based on a knowledge 
of all the facts," that China would shortly achieve " a 
united Government and a cessation of internecine strife." 
The whole tenour of his writing was such as to encourage 
the world at large to see in the sordid strife of politicians 
like Tuan Chi-jui, Chang Hsiin, Sun Yat-sen, and Tang 
Shao-yi, a conflict of high principles, from which an 
enlightened democracy was emerging, with heahng in its 
wings. " The new China," he declared, " is a matter 
of life and death to the people, and the first business of 
the foreigner is to uphold the new behefs." For those 
who fill highly-paid posts as advisers under the Chinese 
Government, this may be so, but for the majority of 
foreigners in the East, the " new beliefs," as manifested 
by the mandarins and military chieftains of the new 
dispensation, are an alien and parasitic growth, which 
threatens to paralyse the ancient and venerable tree of 
Chinese civilisation. 

Mr. Weale's book was written before the world had 
witnessed Russia's appalling demonstration of the truth 
that when a nation unfitted for representative govern- 
ment is cast into the melting-pot of " red " revolution, 
an unprofitable scum rises to the top, and that the conse- 
quences for the man in the street are very different from 
those predicted by the Intellectual harbingers of the 
millennium. The world has witnessed the disillusion of 
the honest dreamers who believed that the Russian 
nation and its government would be purged of evil by 
the abolition of the autocracy; if China's affairs were 
not beyond its normal ken, it would know that here also, 
as in Russia, the patriotic Intellectuals have been put 
to silence and shame by the professional agitator and 
the place-seeker. Almost before Mr. Weale's book was 
pubUshed, the course of events at Peking had revealed 



INTRODUCTORY 13 

something of the real nature of the " civilisation of 
peace " to be expected from the contending political 
factions, for General Chang Hsiin had been whitewashed 
(for value received) and orders had been issued by the 
President for the arrest of Sun Yat-sen and other 
Cantonese malcontents. 

The present brief study of the actual condition of 
affairs in the Far East is based generally on observation 
of the conditions existing early in 1920. At the time 
of my visit to Peking, in February, the storm was 
brewing, which eventually led to the overthrow of 
Marshall Tuan Chi-jui, " Little Hsii," and the Japanese- 
subsidised " Anfu " clique by General Wu Pei-fu and 
the Chihli faction, to a heavy bill of costs by the military 
commanders, and a redistribution of the spoils of office. 
As usual, professional and amateur apologists for the 
" world made safe for democracy," vied with each other 
in proclaiming that the defeat of Tuan and his friends 
assuredly meant the end of false dawns, and that General 
Wu Pei-fu, with his National Convention, would in- 
augurate the long-expected new era. Well, Tuan bowed 
in due course to the superior forces brought to bear 
against him and went his dignified way into lucrative 
retirement ; the National Convention was speedily forgot- 
ten in the turmoil of new intrigues amongst the victors, 
and to-day the Directors of the Southern Parliament still 
refuse to be persuaded to come into the Northern fold, 
and still accuse the Northern leaders of selling their 
country's birthright for a mess of Japanese pottage. 

In the meantime, while the politicians fight for place 
and power, what of the destinies of the common people, 
in whose name and for whose alleged benefit the con- 
tending factions appeal to the world at large? The 
sorrows and sufferings to which the " stupid people " 
have been exposed during the past ten years are very 
seldom mentioned by the apologists of misrule, and the 
Chinese Parliamentarians are more concerned in dis- 
cussing the forms and proceedings of their embryo 



14 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

Constitution than in relieving the miseries of provinces 
decimated by brigandage and famine. These things are 
lightly dismissed, or described as the inevitable con- 
dition of a race inured to such calamities since the begin- 
ning of time. The world will never know the nature 
and extent of the sufferings endured by the common 
people throughout China since the passing of the Manchu 
dynasty, nor will any census reveal the number of those 
who have " gone to their graves like beds." While 
Europe was at war, the affairs of the inarticulate East 
concerned us less than usual; and even to-day, when 
millions are silpntly dying of famine in North China, we 
hear more of Sun Yat-sen's latest political manifestoes 
than of measures for the prevention of these catas- 
trophes. Your optimist de metier points triumphantly to 
the fact that China's foreign trade for the past year 
constitutes a record, and from this fact he proceeds to 
draw conclusions reassuring for the bond-holder and com- 
fortable for the worthy people who like to believe that 
all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds. 

From the chapters of the present work which deal 
with China, the reader may learn something of the con- 
dition of affairs in the summer of 1920, and be able to form 
his own opinion as to the material and moral benefits 
which the Chinese people have derived from the attempt 
of the revolutionaries of 191 1 to adapt to their use and 
for their own advantage the political institutions of the 
West. But in order to make the story more complete in 
detail, and to bring it more fully up to date, let me 
supplement it with certain recent extracts from the 
North China Herald. 

Here, for example, are the Index headings of Outport 
News, as given in the issue of November 15, 1920. (It 
is to be observed that most of the Herald's inland corre- 
spondents are missionaries) : — 

Kuangsi expelled from Canton. 

North Kiangsu notes; the burden of the soldiers. 



INTRODUCTORY 15 

Malcontents of Changsha. 

Szechuan's dramatic victory. 

Independence Day in Szechuan. 

Celebrating the Victory in Szechuan. 

Stranded missionaries in Szechuan, 

The Bandit Tyrant of Pakhoi. 

The new Bank in Tsinanfu. 

Yangchow notes : sacrifice for famine sufferers. 

Skirmish with Robbers. 

The Upper Yangtsze revisited. 

Threatened rising of Tibetans. 

Hangchow notes : inter-College Sports. 

By the Yellow River in Mongolia. 

Teachers on strike in Honan. 

Slavery non-existent in Hongkong. 

Soldiers' requisitions in Hunan. 

Unwelcome visitors in Kneichow. 

Mr. Colvil's death (killed by Chinese troops). 

College Principal beaten by Students. 

Mr. Shaw released. 

Scandalous state of the River Han. 

Japanese Seamen's Combine. 

Pirate raid near Soochow. 

Hongkong's need of wireless. 

The Great Famine in North China. 

Motors in Anhui. 

New American Church in Shaohsing. 

China and Socialism. 

Piracy near Hongkong. 

I venture to suggest that this list presents a picture of 
the actual conditions of affairs in China, of the prevailing 
lawlessness and brigandage and famine, more convincing 
than all the visions of Utopia provided by Peking's 
political pundits. 

Under the heading " The Upper Yangtsze revisited," 
occurs the following note concerning the opium traffic, 
interesting in the light of the many virtuous manifestoes 



16 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

that have been, and are still being, published on the 
subject by the Radical Republican leaders : — 

" The great increase of the contraband opium trade was 
the cause of frequent comment on the Upper Yangtsze. _ It 
seems to parallel what one hears of the liquor-smuggling 
in America, for I was told that large numbers were being 
attracted by the great profits, and people of hitherto 
unimpeachable reputation were engaged in the trade; 
so that in this way, as well as by the use of the drug, 
numerous people were being debauched. . . . Caravans 
of the drug have been brought over by the soldiers from 
Yiinnan and Kueichow, where the planting has been 
encouraged an4 even insisted upon by the officials, who 
in some cases have taxed it when planted, when in blossom, 
and when the drug is gathered. The blame rests entirely 
upon the south-west government, and it would seem that 
the leaders, such as Wu Ting-fang, Tang Shao-yi, Sun 
Yat-sen, C. T. Wang, and others, men of integrity, should 
stop this traffic or accept the responsibihty for it." ^ 

A similar report from South Fukien appeared in the 
North China Herald of November 20, 1920. 

Here is another picture, supplied by a traveller who 
has recently made a journey of some three thousand 
miles through the more remote regions of the Central 
and North-Western provinces and Sin Kiang. It con- 
veys some idea of the kind of felicity which has been 
conferred on the common people by the new dispensation. 

" The country all over is stamped with the seal of war 
and rapine, of the ravages and wholesale destruction and 
massacres caused by the several Mahomedan risings; 
ruins of whose villages, temples, farms, and country 
houses, are met all the way along. 

" Even places such as Sian and Lanchow have lost, 
during this strenuous century of national evolution, the 
lustre of their prestige and glory of yore; rebellion, 

1 I have dealt vdth some facts of the opium trade elsewhere — 
vide page 290. In this connection it is interesting to find an 
authority like Sir Charles Addis publicly announcing, as late as 
the 19th January, 192 1, that "under the Repubhc the Opium 
Trade has been suppressed, the degrading practice of footbinding 
abandoned, examination by torture abolished, early marriages 
discountenanced, a free Press created," etc., etc. 



INTRODUCTORY 17 

revolutions, floods, and other calamities having delivered 
the coup de grace. Minor towns are empty and pretty 
dead; evidence of their once having enjoyed greater 
prosperity is visible, but that is about all there is left ! 
Villages are a collection of squalid hovels." 

The editor of the North China Herald, always a sym- 
pathetic recorder of events and a sincere friend of the 
Chinese people, summed up the situation last July, in 
the following words : — 

" Those who have found it a weariness to follow the 
accounts of China's civil war in our pages from day to 
day, and have found them merely an interminable record 
of bickering and chicanery, have our sympathy; but 
they have nevertheless missed an interesting page of 
history in the making, and an instructive comment on 
the failure of Democracy in this young Republic. The 
present deplorable situation originated in the ineptitude 
of ParUament and in the failure of the people's representa- 
tives to think imperially, or indeed to think of anything 
but their personal profit and selfish aggrandisement. 
China is a vast country and ought to be represented by 
big men; unfortunately, though she has three Parlia- 
ments, one in Peking, one in Canton, and a third which 
proposes to transfer its activities to Chungking, there is 
not to be found in any of them a man who rises above the 
level of mediocrity, and it is to be feared there are many 
who fall beneath even this low standard. . . . The 
present situation is that there is fighting between the 
Chihli and Anhui forces, with the President making futile 
efforts to bring about peace, while Chang Tso-lin threatens 
to march his whole Manchurian army — 100,000 men on 
paper — to crush whoever refuses to hearken to his offers 
or commands. The nation looks on with interest. It 
is a contest between the militarists, and, whoever suc- 
ceeds, the ideal of government by the people for the 
people will not be advanced a hairbreadth. ' When the 
city gate is on fire the fishes in the moat perish,' and 
while armies struggle, agriculture and industry are being 
ruined. WTioever triumphs, the result of the present 
upheaval will doubtless be to keep the yoke of militarism 
as firmly as ever on the neck of the people of China. As 
Europe has learned to its sorrow, it is possible to win the 
c 



18 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

war and lose the peace, so China is beginning to under- 
stand that that blessed word democracy does not mean 
peace, and that prosperity and order are not necessary 
corollaries of a successful revolution and a republican 
form of government. The fact is, the form of govern- 
ment is of much less importance than the character of 
the men who administer it." 

Since these words were written, the world (or that 
small part of it which is interested in the destinies of 
China) has been confronted by the terrible spectacle of 
millions of inoffensive, thrifty peasants dying of starva- 
tion in the farftine region, quite close to the centres of 
Government, while all the time the politicians, callously 
indifferent to their pitiful plight, continue to wrangle 
over the whited supulchre of a meaningless Constitution, 
and the Tuchuns make war, one upon another, for the 
right to plunder the survivors. 

This brief review of actualities, based on the evidence 
of disinterested and sympathetic observers, brings us 
back to first principles, and to emphatic repudiation of 
the idea that law and order, peace and prosperity, can 
be attained in China, either by the present generation or 
the next, through the assertion of democratic ideals or 
the creation of representative institutions. The idea 
springs from the perennial delusion, of those whose 
business or pleasure it is to apply their theories to facts 
of which they have not sufficient experience, that states 
of society can be swiftly re-modelled by legislative enact- 
ments and systems of culture, and that a nation can be 
fitted for self-government by the adoption of a code. In 
the case of the irresponsible mandarins who have so 
grievously mis-ruled China since the revolution, it is 
incontestably true that, in the words of Mill, " the name 
and forms of popular representation have had no effect 
but to prevent despotism from attaining the stability 
and security by which alone its evils can be mitigated or 
its few advantages realised." Can it be doubted that, if 
Yuan Shih-k'ai had been allowed to restore the system 



INTRODUCTORY 19 

of paternal despotism which the Chinese people (man- 
darins included) understand and respect, he would have 
delivered them out of the hands of many of their present 
oppressors, and given peace in his time, even as Diaz 
gave peace to Mexico ? 

Amongst the Intellectual idealists in the United States 
who have lately studied the Chinese problem, the name 
of Professor Dewey carries great weight, and rightly so, 
for his outlook combines a philosophical and scholarly 
attitude with humanism of the benevolent type. He 
differs from the orthodox idealist in so far that he per- 
ceives the fundamental problem of China to be, not 
political, but economic and social. In a recently published 
article, speaking of the characteristic callousness of the 
Chinese, he justly observes : — 

" Where there is a complete manifestation of the 
Malthusian theory of population, friendliness develops 
with great difficulty to the point of active effort to relieve 
suffering; where further increase in population means 
increase in severity of the struggle for subsistence, 
aggressive benevolence is not likely to assume large 
proportions. On the contrary, when the cutting off of 
thousands by plague, or flood, or famine means more 
air to breathe and more land to cultivate for those who 
remain, stoic apathy is not hard to attain." 

Professor Dewey might have added that the same 
observation holds true when the population is decimated 
by battle, murder, and sudden death; these, like all 
other calamities, are philosophically accepted by the 
survivors. But when he comes to discuss the remedy 
for this deplorable condition of affairs, the Professor still 
seeks and finds it in the panaceas of his own class and 
kindred, and advocates a remedy the immediate result 
of which, if applied, would only be to increase the density 
of China's population at the expense of the rest of the 
world. If it be true that China's pro creative reck- 
lessness is the fundamental cause of the pitiful condition 
under which the masses struggle for existence, what can 



20 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

it profit them, or humanity, to stimulate this racial 
tendency by "an introduction of modern industrial 
methods which will profoundly affect their environ- 
ment " ? Is it not self-evident that if " mining, railways, 
and manufacturing, based upon China's wealth of unused 
resources, give a new outlet for energies that cannot now 
be used," the immediate result would be to enable the 
Chinese to compete with other nations in the world's 
food-markets, and, while thus increasing their own 
numbers, to aggravate the problem of existence in coun- 
tries which cannot possibly compete with low-standard 
Oriental labour? China's problem is essentially and 
eternally a food problem, which until now the nation 
has solved, tragically enough, within its own borders. 
To encourage her to solve it henceforth by industrial 
competition with the white race, is very typical of the 
political idealism of a country which nevertheless protects 
itself rigorously against Asiatic immigration. 

Idealism of this curiously illogical kind is by no means 
confined to those professors and philanthropists in the 
United States who have recently displayed interest in 
China ; the same tendency to ignore the existence of all 
unpleasant facts which conflict with preconceived ideas, 
and to proclaim these ideas as facts, has been conspicuous 
in the attitude of several of the distinguished business 
men and politicians who have recently visited China. 
Very typical and instructive, for example, are the words 
in which Mr. Thomas W. Lamont, head of the American 
group of the Consortium, has borne testimony to the 
political activities and influence of American missionaries 
by virtue of which China is to cease to be merely a people 
and become a nation.^ Very significant also were the 
attitude and utterances of the large party of Congress- 
men, accompanied by their wives, sisters, and daughters, 
who visited China last autumn. The party, which 
included Mr. John Burke, Treasurer of the United States, 
and Dr. Paul Reinsch, ex-Minister to China, was enter- 

1 Vids infra, p. 127. 



INTRODUCTORY 21 

tained on its way through Shanghai at a banquet given 
by the Pan-Pacific Association, at which Mr. Tang 
Shao-yi (President of the Association) welcomed the 
distinguished guests, and Dr. Sun Yat-sen held forth 
for over an hour in eloquent eulogy of his own political 
activities, and applauded his persistence in continuing 
the struggle between the South and the North, " in order 
to save China from Japanese militarists." Dr. Reinsch 
spoke for the visitors. The keynote of his speech was 
contained in his fervent declaration that " out of all the 
world, Dr. Sun stood out as the representative of the 
Chinese ideal, true to her inner traditions and the ideals 
Americans believed in. First of all, he was a true and 
great Chinese Liberal." Furthermore, he said that it 
was the duty of the civilised world " to sustain China 
in her struggle for higher organisation of national life. 
There could not be tolerated any intrigue, military or 
diplomatic, against the integrity and sovereignty of 
China. Asia, Africa, and Europe must look upon China 
as the mother of civilisation." 

It would be difficult, I think, to quote a more striking 
example of the hypnotic influence of catchwords and 
preconceived ideas, and of the force of delusions in which 
the wish is ever father to the thought. Dr. Reinsch, 
having had occasion to study the Chinese situation on 
the spot for several years, can scarcely plead ignorance 
of the facts of Dr. Sun Yat -sen's career, of his long and 
intimate connection with " Japanese militarists " and 
financiers; of his acceptance of highly-paid office under 
Yuan Shih-k'ai, against whom he subsequently con- 
spired; of his incessant plots and intrigues against the 
Central Government, no matter how constituted; of his 
failure, during all these years, to originate one single 
measure of constructive reorganisation. Dr. Reinsch 
must be aware that, in the opinion of foreigners in China, 
Dr. Sun has for some years been regarded as a very 
mischievous agitator, and that even in the Chinese Press 
he figures more often as a laughing-stock than as a 



22 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

Liberal. His latest intrigues with the Anfu clique and 
Tuan Chi-jui (whom he formerly denounced as a traitor) 
have proved once more that his ideals are scarcely of the 
kind that most Americans believe in. But Dr. Reinsch 
and his friends prefer to shut their eyes to all these things. 
They remember only that Dr. Sun is, intellectually speak- 
ing, the offspring of American ideals, that he has pro- 
claimed a Republic, professed Christianity, and preached 
the pure doctrine of American democracy. How, then, 
can he fail to be truly representative of the ideal Chinese 
statesman ? Dr. Sun, Mr. Tang Shao-yi, Dr. Wu Ting- 
fang, and other " distinguished leaders of the Constitu- 
tionalist cause," have now gone back to Canton, there 
to re-organise their independent " Military Government " 
and to resume operations, through Kuangsi, against the 
Central Government. Is it exaggerating the influence of 
Dr. Reinsch and his Congressional party to suggest that, 
were it not for their sympathy and support. Dr. Sun 
and his friends might have hesitated before committing 
themselves, and condemning the country, to a further 
period of senseless civil war? 

While on the subject of the Canton Parliament and 
** the leaders of the Constitutionalist cause," it should 
be observed that, apart from the advantages of world- 
wide notoriety to be derived from the direction of civil 
war, the business of Constitution-making, as practised 
by the " true and great Liberals " of the Canton faction, 
is not without its solid advantages. According to a 
Chinese student, who investigated the record of the 
Canton legislators on the spot, and published the results 
in the North China Herald (June 5, 1920), the members 
of the " Old " Parliament at Canton (as distinct from the 
" New " Parliament at Peking) received in salaries and 
subsidies sums amounting to $4,240,000 in less than two 
years. Of this total, half a million dollars represented 
" special contributions for the purpose of completing 
the Constitution for the Republic of China." The inves- 
tigator commented acidly on the fact that, despite this 



INTRODUCTORY 23 

lavish expenditure, the Constitution has not been com- 
pleted, that it remains, in fact, " where it was when 
Yuan Shih-k'ai decided that he could govern the country 
unassisted." He pointed out that, when driven by their 
Kuangsi rivals to seek refuge at Shanghai, these Parlia- 
mentarians " forthwith appointed a Commission to study 
ways and means for raising funds to support themselves." 
Finally, he asked, " what excuse has the Old Parliament 
for living? " and the answer which he gave to this 
question deserves the attention of those who continue 
to proclaim the disinterested patriotism of the Cantonese 
faction. 

" Wliat," he asks, " has the Old Parliament done? It 
has done this and this alone : it has served as a con- 
stitutional smoke-screen for militarists of one faction or 
another. It has befogged the minds of the Chinese and 
foreigners here. It has encouraged civil war for prin- 
ciples in which it has no faith. It has permitted generals 
to battle against each other for jobs and has levied 
payments for its consent. It has sat in Canton, while 
its heart was in Shanghai and Peking. It has per- 
petuated itself and forbidden the compromising of issues 
between North and South on any basis other than its 
own longevity. It has supported its paymaster and 
has forfeited the welfare of the land in accepting this 
support. 

" But its crime consists not in its corruption, but in 
its effects upon the growing generation. Everybody 
knows and accepts the iniquity of Peking officialdom, 
but the country has regarded the Old Parliament as a 
body which stands between corruption and good govern- 
ment. And now that too is gone. Nobody can be 
trusted. There is no honour in China. The country is 
going to boot and nobody cares. So the people speak 
and so the Old Parliament's activities have encouraged 
them to speak." 

(The " Old Parliament," be it noted, includes the most 
brilliant lights of Liberalism and Western learning in 
China's political firmament.) 

But, as will be shown in subsequent chapters, there are 



24 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

many sincere friends of China who, while recognising the 
moral failure of Young China's present leaders, pin their 
faith as firmly as ever to the younger generation of 
Western-educated students, much in the same spirit as 
every English officer pinned his faith to the men of his 
own regiment at the time of the Indian Mutiny. Because 
every human being is, and must always be, the combined 
product of his ancestry and environment, and for other 
reasons, which will be stated in their place, I find it as 
difficult to share this belief to-day as I did in 1911. And 
this scepticism is fortified just as much by doubts as to 
the relevance and moral value of the education which is 
being imparted to the present generation, as by study 
of the results of that education on its predecessors. 

Let me cite two illustrations, both provided in the 
recent writings of " Western-learning " Intellectuals of 
the highest type. In the first, Mr. S. G. Cheng, an M.A. 
of Oxford, describes " Modern China " from the stand- 
point of his own class and creed. Like many of that 
class, Mr. Cheng combines great mental ability with 
sincere patriotism, but his book emphasises on almost 
every page the disabilities produced by Western educa- 
tion on the Oriental mind, which, do what you will, 
remains beneath the surface true to type, contempla- 
tively philosophical and instinctively opposed to the 
practical scientific attitude of Western materialism. Mr. 
Cheng realises that continuance of the present deplorable 
condition of affairs in China is likely to end in national 
disaster, and he attributes this condition to the work of 
a few politicians " who are not supported at all by the 
popular wishes or voice. The Northern Militarists and 
Southern Constitutionalists, who both claim to fight for 
the liberty of the people, alike ignore the feelings and 
sufferings of the silent mass. , . . The future of China 
depends upon the training of her inhabitants that will 
enable them to carry on their Government free from any 
exploitation of political adventurers." In other words, 
the nature of the people must be changed, so as to awaken 



INTRODUCTORY 25 

them to an intelligent capacity of self-government. This, 
he thinks, may be achieved " by education and increasing 
contact with the West," but, like most of those who share 
this opinion, he overlooks the important fact that it is 
chiefly from the " Western-learning " mandarin class 
that to-day's most active groups of political adven- 
turers have emerged ! If this has been the result of 
contact with the West at the top, what justification is 
there for hoping for better results from further dis- 
turbance of the tranquil mind of the masses? 

Very significant are those passages in Mr. Cheng's 
book in which he discusses the political ascendancy of 
Japan at Peking. He sums up the situation frankly in 
these words : "In pursuance of Imperialistic and Jin- 
goistic aims, the Government of Tokyo has bribed certain 
undesirable elements in the country, placed them in 
power and supported them with money to cover their 
administrative expenses." The blame for this state of 
affairs he ascribes, not to the undesirable elements, who 
are in reality the chief offenders, but to Japan. Herein 
he speaks with the same voice as his brilliant confreres, 
Mr. Wellington Koo and C. T. Wang, who represented 
China at the Versailles Conference. Like them, he 
proposes several remedial measures and reforms to relieve 
the situation thus created, such as a revision of the 
Tariff and the abolition of extra-territoriality ; like them, 
also, he remains strangely silent concerning the vital 
need of integrity in the Public Service, and of measures 
to check the activities of the " undesirable elements " 
aforesaid. It will be time to share Young China's en- 
thusiasm for political adventures when its Intellectuals 
have come to recognise and denounce official corruption 
as the chief cause of their country's parlous plight. 

The second illustration to which I refer was contained 
in an apologia for the " returned student," written last 
summer by Dr. M. T. Z. Tyau.^ This writer lays stress 

1 Now legal adviser to the Chinese delegation to the League of 
Nations at Geneva. 



26 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

on the acliieveinents of the class of students educated in 

America and England, by whose influence " the country 

has been changed from an absolute despotism to a popular 

democracy, from an antiquated conservatism to a modern 

liberalism." He goes on to deplore the fact that, the 

number of returned students having greatly increased, 

there are not enough Government jobs to go round, so 

that to-day, " through no fault of his own, he is at a 

' discount, just as the Bank of China and Bank of Com- 

' munications notes are depreciated. Of course, such a 

' state of affairs is abnormal and can only be temporary, 

' just as the Chinese Republic will soon really come into 

' its own. Bilt while the unsatisfactory situation lasts, 

' the position of the returned student is far from enviable. 

' In the keen struggle for existence, diplomas and degrees 

' are often forgotten, and an incumbent {sic) for a certain 

' position might as well have stayed at home, instead of re- 

' turning with a foreign academic or professional training. 

' Consequently, the spectacle is often one of undignified 

' incongruities. This is as it should never be, and in- 

' dubitably will be remedied, as soon as the Liberal 

' elements come into power." A franker exposition of the 

economic basis of Chinese Liberalism would be difficult to 

discover ; Dr. Tyau has put his finger, nevertheless, on the 

spot from whence arises most of the political unrest in 

China. When he proceeds to give a list of the returned 

students to whom is due " the modernisation of China's 

hoary civihsation," he is less convincing. The list begins 

with Ex-President Li Yuan-hung, includes our old friends, 

Wu Ting-fang, Admiral Sah, etc., and ends with Dr. Lew 

Yuklin, formerly Chinese Minister in London. The only 

conclusion which a dispassionate observer can draw from 

it is, that a foreign education does not necessarily unfit 

an intelligent Chinese for a mandarin's career. 

To conclude. If, as I have said, the Chinese people 
are at present neither fitted for the exercise of self- 
government nor anxious for it, if the Republic is nothing 
but a name, and the framework of Parliamentary Govern- 



INTRODUCTORY 27 

ment a hollow mockery, what of the future? By what 
means can China possibly be saved from complete dis- 
integration and her inoffensive and defenceless people 
from further calamities? This question will be dealt 
with in the chapter which deals with the Problem of 
Reconstruction. But it may be useful at the outset to 
summarise certain conclusions which bear upon it : — 

1. The ills that flesh is heir to in China, the chronic 
destitution, diseases, and discontents endured by vast 
numbers of the population, are directly due to the social 
system and religious beliefs, which lAake procreative 
recklessness a duty; these are evils which cannot pos- 
sibly be removed, or even remedied, by any change in 
the form of government or political institutions of the 
nation. 

2. While the inevitable development of China's mines, 
railways, and other sources of latent wealth by modern 
industrial methods is likely to diminish the normal 
severity of economic pressure for a time, by enabling 
her to increase her food supply from abroad, the immediate 
result will be an increase of her population up to the new 
limits of the means of subsistence ; and this increase can 
only be achieved at the cost of increased economic pres- 
sure in countries where labour enjoys a higher standard 
of living. Europe and America will then be compelled 
to protect themselves against the products of Chinese 
industrialism in the same way, and for the same reason, 
that they now protect themselves against Asiatic immi- 
gration. 

3. So long as the present Chinese social system endures, 
the only means by which the ever-latent elements of 
disorder can be held in check is a strong Central Govern- 
ment, organised and administered upon principles which 
the masses understand and to which they always have 
been accustomed ; that is to say, principles of paternal 
despotism, applied in accordance with the spirit and 
traditions of the race. 



28 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

4. Under existing conditions, therefore, a democratic 
form of government, as understood in Europe and 
America, is impossible in China. To encourage the small 
minority of foreign-educated Intellectuals who profess 
to wish to apply it, can only result in making unrest, 
civil war, and brigandage, widespread and endemic, 
instead of local and epidemic. 

5. The rapidly increasing financial and administrative 
difficulties which now confront the Chinese Government, 
as the result of ten years of civil strife and official cor- 
ruption, can only be overcome, and the nation's recupera- 
tive powers encouraged, by concerted action of the 
Powers, directed, in the first instance, to the disarmament 
and disbandment of the rabble armies, which prey upon 
every form of productive industry, and thereafter to the 
moral and material support of the Central Government, 
howsoever constituted. When no more money is forth- 
coming for the maintenance of these armed hordes (and 
that day is close at hand) a crisis will occur ; and to 
escape from their wrath, the mandarins will probably 
endeavour, as usual, to divert unpleasant attention from 
themselves by the instigation of an anti-foreign move- 
ment. When this crisis has passed, a period of recon- 
struction, with foreign supervision over China's finances, 
must of necessity be imposed. 



CHAPTER II 

YUAN SHIH-K'AI (19I2-I916) 

It will be remembered that, after being recalled to 
high office by the panic-stricken Manchus in October 
1911, Yuan Shih-k'ai did all in his power to prevent 
the overthrow of the dynasty and the introduction of 
a Repubhcan form of government.^ For four months 
he struggled manfully against hopeless odds; but 
weakened by internal intrigues, and abandoned by the 
foreign Powers, to which he had confidently looked for 
moral and financial support, he finally made a virtue of 
necessity and accepted the Presidency of the Republic 
in March 1912. It is significant of the condition of 
political affairs in China that, only three months before, 
he had publicly declared that "to be a party to the 
establishment of a Repubhc would brand him as a liar 
before all the world." But in accepting the Presidency, 
with quite obvious mental reservations, he merely 
followed the opportunist traditions of his class and creed. 
He realised that the metropoHtan administration and 
the mandarinate of the provinces were quite as thoroughly 
disorganised and terrified as the Manchus themselves by 
the swift development of Young China's revolution, and 
that the only hope of preserving the country from com- 
plete chaos lay in the re-establishment of a strong central 
authority — ^no matter what its name — at Peking. 

As it was at the time of the triumph of the Young 
Turks in 1908, so it was when Young China upset the 
Dragon Throne in 1911. Misled by the tumult and the 
shouting of students and professional agitators who 
proclaimed the birth of a new era to the cry of " liberty, 

^ Vide Recent Events and Present Policies, pp. 152, et seq. 

29 



30 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

equality, and fraternity," many observers at a distance, 
and some upon the spot, welcomed the estabhshment 
of the Republic as a proof of the Chinese people's political 
consciousness and fitness for representative government. 
In the infectious enthusiasm of the moment, the deep- 
rooted economic evils which are the permanent cause of 
social and political unrest in China, were overlooked; 
the clamour of self-seeking politicians was mistaken for 
an outburst of patriotic fervour, with the result that the 
permanence and constructive capacity of the new forces 
were greatly exaggerated. 

In particular, many English and American missionaries 
were vocationally disposed to believe in Young China's 
intentions and ability to reclaim the people by virtue of 
Western learning and democratic institutions. In their 
zealous enthusiasm at the prospect of reaping the long- 
delayed harvest of their teachings, they were led to 
beheve in the sudden awakening of the Chinese people's 
poUtical morality. Therefore they overlooked not only 
the instinctive conservatism of the inarticulate masses, 
but the self-seeking ambitions which had produced 
this ferment — ^to say nothing of the corruption and 
administrative incapacity which, from the outset, char- 
acterised the revolutionary movement. They beUeved, 
in fact, in the miracle of a national re-birth. Thus it 
came about that the inauguration of the Republic was 
widely proclaimed in Europe and America as the dawn 
of a new era for China. For a year or more, diplomats, 
journalists, and missionaries vied with each other in 
forecasting the nation's brilliant future ; everything that, 
after long centuries of education and effort, Europe had 
evolved in the direction of constitutional government, 
was to be introduced at once, and with complete success, 
in the new Utopia of the Far East. All the ancient 
foundations were to be uprooted with the Throne : Con- 
fucianism, the cult of ancestors, the patriarchal philosophy 
of the Sages, all were to be replaced, in the twinkling of 
an eye, by the latest thing in democratic institutions, 
with a Constitution broad-based on the nation's will, 



YUAN SHIH-K'AI 31 

a government of the people by the people for the people, 
universal suffrage, conscription, and even votes for women. 
Opinions of this kind, arising out of one of the most 
persistent delusions common to humanity, are more 
easily disseminated than dissolved. With regard to 
China's brief vision of Celestial Sociahsm, there are 
many observers who persist in believing in the mystic 
power of political formulae to accomplish the impossible 
and to change the whole structural character of the 
race.^ Yet the history of Young China's brief authority 
has been written with bloodshed and chaos throughout 
the land, in such a manner as to shatter beyond repair 
the people's faith in the heaUng virtue of the blessed 
word Republic. Within a year of Sun Yat -sen's declara- 
tion that the passing of the monarchy heralded " the 
dawn of peace and prosperity, just laws, and honest 
administration," the people's instinctive desire for authori- 
tative rulership had already been clearly demonstrated. 
Even at that time Young China, absorbed in futile 
dissensions and sordid intrigues, had manifested the 
hopelessness of its bright vision of the millennium, while 
the struggle for supremacy between rival military chief- 
tains was beginning to assume definite direction. Eight 
months after the revolution, the military and poHce 
authorities of the provinces had warned the members 
of the National Assembly " to cease from thwarting the 
Government by their senseless and selfish factions." 
The phenomena, which had been regarded by many as 
evidence of the fitness of the Chinese people for self- 
government under European institutions, had rapidly 
proved to be superficial and transient. The reaction of 
the literati, of the military and the merchant classes 
against Sun Yat-sen's political adventures, proved clearly, 
if proof were needed, that the real causes of unrest in 
China remain economic in their origin, and that, for 

^ Thus, quite recently an eminent financier has described the 
estabhshment of the Republic as "an experiment in self-govern- 
ment, unprecedented in scale and unique in its leap from autocracy 
to democracy without passing through the intervening stage of 
feudalism, as in Great Britain and Japan " I 



82 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

these, the catchwords of Republicanism could provide 
neither remedy nor relief. 

It is not only interesting, but profitable, to look back 
upon and study the masterly statecraft by means of 
which Yuan succeeded in bringing something like order 
out of chaos, restoring the authority of the Central 
Government in many of the provinces, and repairing the 
administrative and fiscal machinery, dislocated by the 
revolution. For it may safely be predicted that, when- 
ever the Strong Man emerges who shall put an end to 
the present suicidal strife of factions, the methods by 
which he will attain to and maintain his authority will 
be based on the stratagems and devices of Yuan Shih-k'ai 
and of his illustrious predecessor, Li Hung-chang. At 
the end of his first year of ofhce in the Presidency, the 
Radicals of the Kuo-Min tang party still held the balance 
of power and Yuan's attitude was one of watchful waiting. 
He knew full well that the activities of Young China, 
the hybrid radicalism of Sun Yat-sen and his fellow 
fanatics, must speedily wear themselves out in futihty 
against the irresistible deadweight of national con- 
servatism. He could afford to give them rope, to let 
them discuss their paper constitutions and democratic 
ideals at Peking, while his secret agents were busy in 
the provinces, organising at strategical points the forces 
with which, when the time came, he would be able to 
put an end to any armed assaults that might be organised 
by the political factions. At that date it was impossible, 
by the light of Yuan's record under the Manchu dynasty, 
to predict his line of action or to gauge the measure of 
his strength of purpose in a protracted crisis. It had 
already been made manifest, for all who had eyes to see 
and ears to hear, that the Republic was a political 
interregnum, destined sooner or later to be replaced 
either by the absolute Monarchy of the Man of Destiny, 
or by a limited Monarchy tempered by cautious experi- 
ments in Constitutionahsm ; but even those who appre- 
ciated Yuan's statesmanship could not assert with any 



YUAN SHIH-K'AI 33 

degree of confidence that he would display the quahties 
necessary to attain even partial command of a situation 
so complicated and so dangerous. It remained to be 
proved that he possessed the combination of diplomatic 
suppleness and ruthless despotism which is required for 
the making of a ruler in China. The velvet glove had 
been in evidence on more than one historic occasion — 
notably at the crisis of the Old Buddha's coup d'etat in 
September 1898 — but the iron hand had never been 
revealed in absolute authority. 

Looking back to-day upon the chief events of Yuan's 
administration of the Presidency of the Republic, it is 
interesting to observe how each one marked a distinct 
and pre-arranged advance in a resolutely consistent 
poUcy, that policy which Yuan had frankly proclaimed 
from the outset as the country's only possible way of 
salvation. Western observers, even when famiUar with 
the principles and practice of Chinese officialdom, found 
some difficulty in accounting for the boldness with which, 
at the first crisis of the revolution. Yuan resisted the 
aboHtion of the Monarchy and held his ground, almost 
alone, against the forces of Young China triumphant. 
They found it harder still to explain how it came to 
pass that, having thus declared himself, a man of Yuan's 
proved capacity in tactics of expediency should have 
been elected to the Presidency by the vote of Sun Yat-sen 
and his revolutionary colleagues, and that these men 
should apparently have believed in his conversion to 
democratic principles of government. And as they 
gradually came to perceive in each of his carefully-timed 
dramatic coups the working out to its logical conclusion 
of his unswerving belief in despotic government, all 
clearly pointing to the inevitable restoration of auto- 
cracy, it became correspondingly difficult to account for 
the childlike confidence in him displayed by the leaders 
of the Kuo-Min tang. It is impossible to beheve that 
the members of the Nanking Assembly were individually 
and collectively beguiled by Yuan's belated profession 



34 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

of faith in the Republic : their naivete in this matter 
can only be explained on the assumption that the dele- 
gates were more concerned for the furthering of their 
private ambitions than for the application of Republican 
principles, and that they looked to Yuan to play the 
game of party poUtics, as they conceived it, and with 
due regard to the part which they had played in putting 
him at the head of affairs. 

The issue proved that they misjudged their man 
and the solidity of the classical orthodoxy which he 
had proclaimed in defending the Monarchy. Yuan, as 
President, proved himself a past-master in all the arts 
of mandarin intrigue : expert in opportunism, prudent in 
counsel, of many devices ; a very Ulysses for stratagem, 
unwavering in the execution of his plans. He adhered 
boldly to the corrupt traditions of venal expediency, 
which have characterised the Government of China for 
centuries, to the nepotism and tortuous methods of 
Oriental statecraft ; but in all, and above all, he fought 
steadily for the maintenance of the unbroken continuity 
of time-honoured traditions, for the preservation of the 
philosophy and morality of the Confucian system, and 
for the maintenance of the ancient social structure of 
civilisation, founded upon that system, whose apex is 
the Dragon Throne. He acted from the outset upon 
the conviction, which he had frankly confessed to The 
Times correspondent at Peking on November 20, igii, 
that " the institution of a Repubhc could only mean the 
instability of a rampant democracy, of dissension and 
partition," and that its results would be chaos, " amidst 
which all interests would suffer and for several decades 
there would be no peace in the Empire." He believed, 
with good cause, that the politicians of Young China 
were either vain dreamers or ambitious place-seekers, 
and that by no possibiUty could their dreams be brought 
into any direct relation with the actualities of the hfe, 
the deep-rooted reverences and beliefs, of the Chinese 
people. Upon this belief he acted consistently, even 



YUAN SHIH-K'AI 35 

while yielding lip-service to the RepubHcan form of 
government and taking an empty oath of allegiance to 
the principle of representative institutions. 

It is unnecessary to recapitulate here the incidents — 
many of them tragically sordid — of Yuan's successful 
campaign against the " rampant democracy " of Young 
China, or to trace in their order the stages by which he 
has slowly but surely restored the ancient edifice of 
autocracy, revered by the orthodox literati and accepted 
by the Chinese people as the foundation of the imme- 
morial order of things. Two incidents, however, which 
clearly indicated the President's pohcy and the methods 
by which it was to be fulfilled, deserve to be remembered. 
The first was the summary execution, by his orders, of 
two RepubHcan generals, accused of treasonable con- 
spiracy at Wuchang, in August 1912 — an act of auto- 
cratic martial law administered a I'Orientale, without 
hesitation or formaUties. The second was the assas- 
sination at Shanghai, in April 1913, of Sung Chiao-jen, 
the Kuo-Min tang's candidate for the Premiership, 
under circumstances which pointed clearly to the com- 
pHcity, if not the direct instigation, of the President. 
The Republican generals at Wuchang were dangerous 
because they were capable of organising a military 
revolt ; Sung Chiao-jen was dangerous because, at the 
moment when the National Assembly was about to 
meet for the first time, he was the uncompromising 
advocate of Parliamentary, as opposed to Presidential, 
authority. In both instances the dangers were swiftly 
and ruthlessly removed, by measures of despotic bar- 
barity as cold-blooded as those of Tzu Hsi at the height 
of her power; and in both instances Yuan's knowledge 
of his countrymen was justified by the fact that the 
nation accepted the situation without indignation, almost 
with indifference. According to Tho Times correspon- 
dent, indeed, the general opinion in China in the autumn 
of 1912, instinctively recognising the need for some 
effective authority, blamed Yuan for being " far too 



36 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

anxious not to transgress constitutional limits." He 
speedily rectified his shortcomings in that respect. If 
at any time after his inauguration as President he dis- 
played a conciliatory attitude towards Young China, 
subsequent events proved that he was merely drawing 
back in order to jump the more effectively. 

At the outset, Yuan's position was rendered danger- 
ously insecure for lack of the sinews of war: until he 
had negotiated a large foreign loan, his authority lacked 
not only the prestige which recognition by the Powers 
conferred, but it lacked the means of purchasing the 
" loyalty " of military commanders like Chang Hsiin 
and providing his agents at the provincial capitals with 
the only argument which is invariably convincing in 
China. Once placed in possession of funds, however, 
and assured of the sympathy and support of the Govern- 
ments which direct the operations of the " Five Powers " 
group of financiers, Yuan could face with equanimity the 
Cantonese party's last desperate bid for place and power. 
" The war to punish Yuan " (July 1913) was a melan- 
choly fiasco, and incidentally a valuable object-lesson 
in Chinese politics, because from beginning to end it 
was a matter of dollars and cents. The Army and Navy 
were frankly at the service of the highest bidder, and the 
only cash bidder was Yuan. 

It was only after the President's easy victory over the 
rabble forces of Sun Yat-sen and Huang Hsing that his 
policy of centralisation revealed the hand of the Strong 
Man and his intention of restoring the principles and 
practice of autocratic government. He had bided his 
time — ^he had endured with philosophic calm the invasion 
of the high places of the metropoUtan government by 
hordes of turbulent "Western-learning" students; he 
had given them rope, and they had hanged themselves. 
After the collapse of the last possible attempt at organ- 
ised insurrection, the proscription of the Kuo-Min tang 
was inevitable. He removed it, as Cromwell removed 
the Rump Parliament, and no dog barked in all the 



YUAN SHIH-K'AI 8T 

land. At his subsequent formal " election " to the 
Presidency on October 6, 1913, he took occasion to 
emphasise the fact that, for the future, he proposed to 
rule without interference, in accordance with ancient 
tradition. " Restrictions have been placed on my 
authority," he observed, " which have hampered me in 
my work of promoting the country's best interests," 
to which was added the significant reminder that " he 
had always preferred conservative to radical courses." 
He proceeded, therefore, to adopt them, removing, one 
by one, the flimsy props of the Cantonese jerry-built 
Repubhcanism with the deliberate precision of a chess- 
player ; and all the while, as he destroyed the substance 
of representative government, he continued solemnly to 
pay his respects to the memory of its shadow. 

There was nothing surprising in the fact that Yuan 
Shih-k'ai, having defeated the armed forces of his political 
opponents, should have put an end to the farce of Parlia- 
mentary government at Peking by decreeing the dis- 
solution of the Kuo-Min tang. From the Chinese point 
of view, there was nothing remarkable in his action ; 
nor was there anything contrary to Chinese traditions 
of statecraft in the " face-saving " expedients and ex- 
planations by which he justified every subsequent move 
in a perfectly-planned policy. The only really remark- 
able feature of the situation lay in the failure of many 
European observers to foresee its inevitable conclusion, 
and in their apparently sincere belief that constitutional 
methods of government were still within the range of 
practical politics at Peking. The dissolution of the 
Kuo-Min tang resulted naturally in the abolition of the 
National Assembly, and thereafter, equally logically, in 
the suppression of the local self-government AssembUes 
throughout the country. Parliament was replaced by 
a PoHtical Council and an " Administrative Conference 
for the revision of the Constitution." The Administra- 
tive Conference, a body of seventy-one members, was 
composed almost exclusively of men selected by the 



38 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

President and by his agents, the Tutuhs, in the provinces, 
literati and officials of the old regime. Yuan Shih-k'ai's 
first Presidential address to this body left no room for 
further doubts as to his poHcy. " The Repubhc," he 
declared, "had been in existence for two years, and 
during this period, principles and laws have been dragged 
in the dust, while morality, self-control, and righteous- 
ness have been swept into oblivion " — ^in other words, 
his own wise forecast had been completely fulfilled. 
Thereafter, adopting the traditional phraseology of 
Imperial decrees, he proceeded to express his opinion 
of " the minority of turbulent demagogues," who had 
brought such evils upon the State, the " specious rogues " 
who talked glibly of liberty, equality, and patriotism, 
"intent all the while on possessing themselves of others* 
wealth, with which they flee overseas, seeking shelter 
under the segis of the foreigner." Finally, after express- 
ing his belief in gradual reforms and his intention to 
adopt a policy of practical reconstruction, he declared 
that, in his experience of the art of government, men 
and money were more useful than revolutionary theories. 
As regards money, he was by no means well sup- 
plied; but the men were ready to his hand, and those 
whom he selected as Tutuhs, to direct and express " public 
opinion " in the provinces, served him, on the whole, 
faithfully and well. With the scrupulous regard for 
appearances, the careful whitening of sepulchres, which, 
is the first principle of government in China, every step 
which Yuan subsequently took towards the practical 
reconstruction of the old orthodox autocracy and central- 
isation of power, was taken ostensibly in response to 
the unanimous petition of the Tutuhs. On their repre- 
sentations (thoughtfully drafted, to prevent possible 
mistakes, in the President's Secretariat) the Provincial 
Assemblies were abolished. With their approval, — -^ 
that of the Political Council, the Worship of Hea 
was revived, with ceremonies similar to those observ. 
by the Manchu dynasty. At their instance, the Pro 



YUAN SHIH-K'AI 39 

visional Constitution was suspended till a more con- 
venient season, and replaced by the Presidential system 
of government. The Cabinet became little more than 
a perfunctory body of well-paid secretaries, and the 
Premier's only duties were to appear at diplomatic 
functions and to countersign, pro forma, the Presidential 
mandates. The Conference for the re-drafting of the 
Constitution, which met on March i8, 1914, afforded an 
indication of its quality by proposing to amend certain 
articles of the Code so as to confer on the President 
full power to declare war and make treaties without 
Parliamentary sanction. This was a typical example of 
collective " face-saving " — for all concerned were well 
aware that, in the absence of a successful revolution, 
there was no likelihood of any Parliament being con- 
vened. Had not the Provincial Assemblies been dissolved 
for " perversely usurping financial authority and ob- 
structing the business of administration " ? Per contra, 
at this juncture Yuan Shih-k'ai gave proof of the begin- 
ning of a policy of reconstruction, by instituting examina- 
tions to test the fitness of District Magistrates and other 
local authorities — a highly necessary reform, which might 
have led to practical results had Yuan been spared and 
had it been honestly carried out by competent examiners. 
So long as Yuan Shih-k'ai's policy was confined to 
political and financial measures, clearly directed towards 
the re-establishment of the old order of metropolitan 
administration, pubhc opinion accepted it placidly 
enough as a normal reaction against innovations that 
ran counter to the instincts and customs of the people. 
The Press, still largely controlled by Young China at 
the Treaty Ports, denounced it as unconstitutional, but 
the masses, knowing nothing of constitutions, were 
evidently unconcerned in the disputes of the scribes 
and politicians. They were only anxious that the blood- 
shed and brigandage, which they had come to associate 
with Republican ideas, should cease ; wheresoever public 
opinion was articulate, it was evidently disposed to hope 



40 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

that Yuan, the Strong Man, would succeed in restoring 
law and order. The common people were weary of being 
looted in the name of liberty. It was only when the 
President, acting upon the " advice " of the Administra- 
tive Council, decided henceforward to perform the 
Winter Solstice sacrifice at the Temple of Heaven, that 
he became, in the sight of the people, something far 
more important than an administrator and a pohtician. 
By this momentous decision. Yuan Shih-k'ai carried his 
original profession of political faith to its logical con- 
clusion — a conclusion which concerned the sons of Han 
in their daily lives, because it meant the restoration of 
the social structure, the re-assertion of things which the 
iconoclasts of Young China had threatened utterly to 
destroy. By this decision, as a Times correspondent 
in Peking justly observed, " the President practically 
proclaimed himself an autocratic ruler, who is responsible 
not to the nation, but to the Almighty alone." Yet even 
in so doing, Yuan was careful to have it suggested by 
his faithful Councillors that the Worship of Heaven was 
originally " Republican in spirit." And all the while, 
" in the profound seclusion of the Palace," he kept a firm 
grasp on the situation, gauging the force of pubhc opinion 
from every quarter, timing every move in the game 
with the precision of a master-player, steadily increasing 
his hold over the provinces and their revenue-producing 
capacity. He knew — none better — that the loyalty of 
the majority of his supporters, and particularly of the 
army, was au fond a loyalty of loaves and fishes. He 
realised that his power to rule the Empire must ever 
depend on control of ready money sufficient to secure 
the removal or conversion of malcontents and to provide 
for the repression by force of widespread elements of 
disorder. As for the masses of the people, he declared 
his firm belief that they, like himself, were " no lovers 
of changes which run counter to immemorial custom " ; 
for the rest, he knew that they cared not at all what 
the form or fashion of the Government may be, so long 



YUAN SHIH-K'AI 41 

as it secured for them surcease of civil strife and reasonable 
security for life and property. 

The Presidential mandates issued by Yuan Shih-k'ai 
at this period afforded striking proof of his profound 
knowledge of his countrymen and of his conviction that 
they would welcome the restoration of the autocratic 
form of government to which they were accustomed. 
These mandates afford also instructive example of the 
curious admixture of patriarchal philosophy and childish 
naivete which characterises the Chinese mind (whether 
Young or Old) whenever it attempts to graft new wood 
of European origin upon the venerable tree of native 
statecraft. The avowed purpose of the most important 
of these mandates was " to lay the permanent founda- 
tions of the new constitution in China " ; its immediate 
and practical result was to remove the last vestiges of 
constitutional procedure. " The most renowned scholars 
of East and West," it declared, "are agreed that, in 
framing a fundamental law, it is essential to bear in 
mind the condition of the people. No good can possibly 
come of cutting one's feet to fit a pair of shoes." So 
the shoes were made to fit the understandings of the 
day, good comfortable shoes, fashioned on the old dynastic 
last. The Presidential election law, promulgated in 
December 1914, conferred ten years of office on the 
President, who was to be ehgible for re-election by a 
vote of two-thirds of the Administrative Council. To 
" prevent intrigue and strife," the President was em- 
powered to nominate three persons, whose names were 
to be recorded and secreted upon a table of gold, one of 
whom was to succeed him in the event of his death. 

Another mandate, issued in response to a memorial 
by the Censors, decreed that henceforth " no member 
of any political party shall be ehgible for membership 
of Parhament." The Censors based their memorial on 
the lamentable fact that " China's recently dissolved 
Parhament became a laughing-stock, because all its 
members belonged to political parties. Among them 



42 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

were to be found men who degraded the profession of 
letters, men who indulged in windy rhetoric, who em- 
ployed money, and even arms, to turn the country upside 
down. The parties used their collective strength to 
influence elections and usurp power." By the re-drafting 
of the Constitution, full powers were conferred upon the 
President to declare war and make treaties. In his 
hands, also, was placed supreme authority over the 
finances and armed forces of the country. Finally, a 
leaf was carefully selected from Great Britain's wait- 
and-see procedure of Parliamentary reform by the 
promise of a mpdel Parliament, to consist of an Upper 
and a Lower House, to be elected and convened at 
some convenient season in the dim future. 

Thus, out of the chaos left by the passing of the Manchus 
and the turmoil of the revolution. Yuan Shih-k'ai's genius 
of statesmanship, conforming strictly to the ancient 
classical model, succeeded in effectively restoring the 
authority of the metropohtan administration, with him- 
self as its head, in the undisguised capacity of Dictator. 
Every stage in his intricate programme was silently and 
skilfully carried out with the polished smoothness of a 
conjuring performance, and the general effect on the 
audience was such as to completely justify those who 
hold that the Chinese people are in no sense fitted, or 
even anxious, for self-government. In other words, only 
under a benevolent form of despotism, conforming to 
the Confucian traditions of government, can law and 
order be maintained. By his very aloofness and dignified 
reticence, by his acute perception of the " happy mean " 
and pursuance of the lines of least resistance, by his 
masterly handling of semi-independent military chiefs 
and provincial officials. Yuan succeeded in establishing 
himself in the eyes of the people as the Man of Destiny, 
the only ruler in sight who could possibly hold in check 
the ever-present elements of disorder. 

The divine right of monarchs in China being in- 
timately bound up with the sacred institution of ancestor- 



YUAN SHIH-K'AI 43 

worship, it is a matter of tradition that no new dynasty 
can rightfully claim the " mandate of Heaven " unless 
it has overthrown its predecessor by force of arms. It 
is safe to say that when Yuan struggled to retain the 
Manchu hierarchy in its place, as a figure-head shorn of 
despotic authority, he did so because he realised that 
the eventual restoration of the Throne was inevitable, 
and that grave dangers must confront the creation of a 
new Imperial House. Those dangers were undoubtedly 
lessened by the insidiously-gradual assertion of Yuan's 
autocratic authority, and by the fact that the people 
(including the Manchu clans) were thus led to regard him 
as the head of the State. Some of his methods were 
extremely " slim," and certain of his swift reprisals 
were barbarous, according to Western ideas, but all 
conformed to time-honoured precedents of Chinese rule, 
and therefore none aroused anything like popular 
indignation. 

Yuan Shih-k'ai's subsequent attempt to restore the 
monarchical system of government in his own person 
merely carried his openly-avowed principles to their 
most natural conclusion. Neither by his actions nor by 
his utterances had he ever definitely abandoned those 
principles or modified his profound distrust of " changes 
which run counter to immemorial custom." Had the 
question of the monarchy been solved along the lines of 
classical tradition, as a matter of internal politics, it 
can hardly be doubted that Yuan, as Emperor, would 
have succeeded in estabUshing his effective authority to 
the general satisfaction and benefit of the Chinese people. 
Apart from the opposition of the Kuo-Min tang faction 
led by Sun Yat-sen — nationally speaking, not so im- 
portant a factor in the situation as some foreign observers 
were led to believe — everything pointed to the prob- 
abihty that the nation, if left to itself, would have wel- 
comed the restoration of the Monarchy, if only because 
the masses had come to associate the Republican doctrine 
with bloodshed and brigandage. The ruling class, the 



44 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

mandarin hierarchy, were clearly in sympathy with the 
restoration of the monarchical form of government. 

But the question was not destined to be settled as a 
matter of internal politics. The plans of Yuan Shih-k'ai 
and his supporters failed to realise the dangers of foreign 
intervention, and particularly the interest evoked in 
Japan by any important change in China's affairs. The 
President's methods and mandates during the year pre- 
ceding his acceptance of the Throne afforded striking 
proof of his profound knowledge of his countrymen, 
but they revealed also his inability to appreciate the 
international situation. 

The movement for the restoration of the Monarchy, 
organised by the Chou-An-hui Society, began to assume 
a definite form a year after the outbreak of war in Europe, 
in August 1915. It failed conspicuously to take into 
account the significance of the demands which Japan 
had addressed to China, in settlement of her outstanding 
claims, after the expulsion of the Germans from Kiao- 
Chao. These demands, submitted to the Chinese Govern- 
ment in the form of a Protocol by Mr. Hioki on January 
18, 1915, were unmistakably of a nature to emphasise 
the special rights and material interests claimed by 
Japan as the result of her victories. As The Times 
observed, " it was obvious to everybody, except, perhaps, 
to the Chinese statesmen, that Japan would probably 
make use of her opportunity to obtain some definite 
settlement of her many outstanding claims against her 
neighbour." We need not here recapitulate these claims 
or describe the subsequent negotiations which took place 
at Peking between January and May. It was recognised 
in England that certain of the " contingent " and question- 
able demands put forward (which were not communicated 
to the Allied Powers) were inspired by the exigencies of 
the internal political situation in Japan. The Okuma 
Government had been defeated in the Chamber and a 
General Election was impending, in which the Government 
had perforce to reckon with a strong popular demand 



YUAN SHIH-K'AI 45 

for a more active " forward " policy in China. After 
four months of tedious negotiations at Peking (in which 
German intrigue played an important role by means 
of a systematic propaganda of falsehood in the Chinese 
Press) the Japanese Government presented an ultimatum 
to China (May 6) in which the " contingent " demands 
above mentioned were withdrawn and reserved for 
future discussion. Count Okuma's party had won the 
elections in March, but popular feeling was still strongly 
expressed on the subject of China, and the Government 
was being charged with vacillation and urged to employ 
military force to back its demands. On April 2, Count 
Okuma had taken occasion, through Renter's corre- 
spondent, to declare that Japan's position and policy in 
her negotiations with China had been deliberately mis- 
represented, especially in America, as the result of false 
statements spread broadcast by German agents. 

The attitude of Yuan Shih-k'ai throughout these 
negotiations was friendly but evasive; in refusing the 
greater part of the Japanese claims, he took his stand 
on the ground that it was not possible for the Chinese 
Government to concede any demands calculated to 
impair China's sovereignty or the Treaty rights of other 
Powers, an attitude which barred discussion of many 
of the questions which Japan had raised. He had also 
stipulated from the outset that Kiao-Chao should be 
completely restored to China and that China should be 
represented in the general peace negotiations after the 
war. In declining the finally modified demands of the 
Japanese Government on May 3, the Chinese Foreign 
Office expressed itself in a distinctly unconciliatory 
manner, revealing most inopportunely the traditional 
mandarin arrogance and contempt for Japan's claims 
to be treated as a great Power. In this attitude it was 
encouraged, no doubt, by Count Okuma's public declara- 
tion of pacific and reasonable intentions. When subse- 
quently confronted with a forty-eight-hour ultimatum, 
however, Yuan Shih-k'ai and his advisers made the 



46 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

usual virtue of necessity and promptly yielded. By the 
terms of the settlement thus effected, Japan regularised 
and consolidated her position in Shantung (in succession 
to the Germans), in South Manchuria, Eastern Inner 
Mongolia, and on the coast of Fukhien province. 

Yuan Shih-k'ai's diplomacy had brought him thus far 
fairly successfully through a difficult situation; but his 
usual astuteness was lacking when he failed to draw 
from these negotiations the obvious conclusion that, in 
the matter of his personal ambitions to found a new 
dynasty, he would have to reckon seriously with the 
Japanese Government. He had never been persona 
grata in Japan since the days when, as Li Hung Chang's 
lieutenant and Resident in Korea, he had opposed 
Japanese policy and supported that of Russia ; he might 
well have foreseen that the Government at Tokyo would 
discourage any attempt on his part to establish himself 
upon the Throne of China. He was certainly not without 
warning on this score. One of the ablest and most 
influential writers in China, the famous scholar Liang 
Ch'i-ch'ao, who had served as Minister of Justice in 
Yuan's first Cabinet during the crisis of 191 1, and had 
then strongly supported the maintenance of the Monarchy 
together with a constitutional form of government, re- 
tired from the State Council in August 1915, and openly 
denounced the monarchical movement on broad principles 
of national policy. In September he published his opinions 
on the subject in a series of articles in the Peking Gazette. 
His objections to Yuan's accession to the Throne were 
based partly on grounds of classical orthodoxy and partly 
on recognition of the certainty of Japan's intervention. 
Regarding the matter from the point of view of historical 
precedents, ever dear to the mind of the literati, he 
observed that public opinion would undoubtedly support 
the President's accession to the Throne "if he had first 
defeated a foreign foe in a decisive battle." There being 
no immediate prospect of this solution, he laid stress 
on the fact that " full recognition of the Monarchy was 



YUAN SHIH-K'AI 47 

not likely to be accorded to China by certain Powers 
until after the Peace Conference of Europe has con- 
cluded its business." Referring specifically to Japan, 
he observed that " the country which has the loudest 
voice in our affairs is that which lies close to our elbow," 
and predicted that " if this country has occasion to 
consider the question of recognition, it will also have 
occasion to interfere. Even a little child," he con- 
cluded, " can foresee that Japan will not recognise the 
new Government without demanding the concession of 
further privileges, which China dare not refuse." Yuan 
Shih-k'ai was undoubtedly impressed by the views of 
this famous WTiter. He recognised their far-reaching 
influence, and made every effort to enlist Liang Ch'i- 
ch'ao's support and to persuade him to speak smooth 
things; but in vain. 

In October the State Council made a show of consti- 
tutional procedure by referring the question of the 
Monarchy to a vote of the provinces, or rather to a 
number of individuals selected by the President and 
his supporters to represent them. In due course, on 
October 30, the expected happened. The Japanese 
Minister at Peking, accompanied by his British and 
Russian colleagues, called at the Chinese Foreign Office 
and offered friendly advice on behalf of his Government 
against the restoration of the monarchical system. He 
pointed out that while Europe was at war it would be 
dangerous for China to make changes likely to create 
internal dissensions; for this reason his Government 
respectfully advised the President temporarily to post- 
pone the projected change. The Foreign Minister re- 
plied that the Chinese Government had no reason to 
anticipate serious opposition in the provinces, and that, 
having referred the question to the decision of the people, 
they must abide by the issue, whatever it might be. 
The issue, of which there never was any doubt, was a 
practically unanimous " vote " in favour of Yuan's 
accession (November 5). Yuan Shih-k'ai's attitude at 



48 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

this juncture plainly intimated his conviction that the 
danger of foreign intervention in China's domestic affairs 
would not be increased or diminished by any change in 
the form of the Government. He believed, indeed, that 
the pre-occupation of the European Powers in the war 
had greatly lessened the chance of such intervention, 
and he evidently under-estimated the risk of serious 
opposition being organised against him in China. As 
regards Japan, he appears to have thought that active 
intervention from that quarter would strengthen his 
hands and gain for him the support of patriotic opinion, 
even among the Young China revolutionaries. In defer- 
ence to further representations from the Japanese Minister 
and his colleagues, he directed the Minister for Foreign 
Affairs to state that the Government was in a position to 
deal with opposition in China, but that it must depend 
on the good offices of foreign Governments to control 
revolutionaries domiciled outside its jurisdiction — an 
unmistakable reference to the support given in Japan to 
Sun Yat-sen, Huang Hsing, and other political agitators. 
Here, again, Yuan's courage was greater than his wisdom ; 
for his experience during the revolution of 191 1 and on 
many other occasions should have reminded him that 
revolutions in China are rather a matter of money than 
of political ideals, and that a handful of energetic men, 
provided with sufficient dollars, could get the rabble 
army of any province to move in any and every direc- 
tion. On November 9 the Chinese Government, while 
adhering to its intentions, announced that no change in 
the system of government would take place before the 
New Year. 

On December 6 came the first mutterings of the storm 
which eventually put an end to Yuan Shih-k'ai and all 
his ambitions. A Government cruiser lying off the 
Arsenal at Shanghai was seized by a party of thirty 
revolutionaries, chiefly naval students ; but the affair was 
purely local, and the subsequent proceedings on both 
sides savoured of opera houffe. Thereupon the State 



YUAN SHIH-K'AI 49 

Council memorialised the President to put an end to 
the prevalent uncertainty and unrest by proclaiming 
himself Emperor without further delay. After the 
customary face-saving protestations of unworthiness, 
Yuan Shih-k'ai complied, and on December 12 the 
Monarchy was proclaimed. The coronation ceremony 
was fixed for February 9. But it was not to be. 

Within a week after the issue of the mandate announc- 
ing Yuan's accession came rumours of a serious insur- 
rection brewing in the far-western province of Yiinnan, 
organised and led by Tsai Ao, a military official educated 
in Japan, whom Yuan had appointed to the military 
governorship of the province after the revolution. On 
December 27 the revolutionary leaders and gentry of 
Yiinnan declared the independence of their province, 
in opposition to the Monarchy, and Tsai Ao dispatched 
a rabble army, estimated at 30,000 men, against the 
Imperial forces which had been hurriedly sent to Szechuan. 
Despite initial successes gained by the Government, the 
insurrectionary movement spread rapidly; it was bound 
to do so, in view of the fact that in nearly every province 
there were bodies of unpaid and undisciplined troops, 
under generals of doubtful loyalty, eager for oppor- 
tunities of looting. By the end of January the provinces 
of Kueichou and Kwangsi had renounced their allegiance. 
Yuan's star was now visibly declining, and his sup- 
porters, following the cautious custom of their class, were 
deserting him. When his right-hand man, Feng Kuo- 
chang, the Commander-in-Chief at Nanking, declined to 
support him, and bodies of the Imperial troops began to 
make common cause with the rebels, his friends at the 
capital persuaded him to issue an official announcement 
(January 22) that the establishment of the Monarchy 
would be indefinitely postponed. But the step came 
too late. In China nothing fails like failure, and Yuan, 
as aspirant Emperor, could never hope to command 
from the literati the same kind of blind loyalty which the 
best type of classical Confucianists displayed for the 



60 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

Manchu dynasty, even in its decline. By the end of 
March the tide of ill-fortune was running so strongly 
against him that his few remaining friends urged him to 
abdicate the Presidency and retire into private life. A 
month later the provinces of Kuangtung and Kiangsi had 
joined the hue and cry ; Yuan was denounced as a traitor 
and usurper by the representatives of the same provinces 
which had urged him to ascend the Throne six months 
before. The remnants of his army were isolated and 
helpless in far-off Szechuan, the provincial Treasuries 
had suspended all remittances to Peking, and his act of 
renunciation had merely served to intensify the vindic- 
tive feelings arid personal ambitions of his adversaries. 
His position was clearly impossible; even amidst his 
own proteges of the Court faction there were few to do 
reverence to the Strong Man who had failed. On April 22, 
hoping still to retrieve something of the desperate situa- 
tion, Yuan agreed to surrender all civil authority to the 
Cabinet, reconstructed under the Premiership of Tuan 
Chi-jui, who came to the front at this juncture. Tuan 
had been Yuan's Minister of War in 1913, when he had 
displayed much energy and ability in defeating the 
abortive " campaign to punish Yuan," launched by Sun 
Yat-sen and his revolutionary friends. Despite his con- 
servative and monarchical tendencies, he was popular 
with the leaders of the southern faction ; an able diplo- 
matist, and credited by his friends with unusual nimble- 
ness of opinion in politics. Upon his accession to the 
Premiership, his Cabinet proceeded to placate the south- 
ern party by announcing its intention of re-establishing 
Parliamentary Government at an early date. Meanwhile 
the southern Kuo-Min tang leaders had proclaimed 
Li Yuan-hung, the Vice-President of the Republic, as 
President, and had constituted themselves into a new 
Provisional Government at Canton, without reference 
to Peking. What would have been the ultimate fate of 
Yuan Shih-k'ai under these conditions, none can say; 
he solved all such problems by dying on June 5. The 



YUAN SHIH-K'AI 51 

medical men who attended him ascribed his death to 
kidney trouble and nervous prostration; the man in 
the street at Peking said, with equal truth, that he died 
of " eating bitterness " and loss of face. Officialdom at 
Peking appeased its conscience, and possibly placated 
the soul of the departed, by a State funeral on a most 
imposing scale. 

Yuan Shih-k'ai having passed to his rest, Li Yuan- 
hung became President of the Chinese Republic, with 
Tuan Chi-jui as Premier. The country, or rather the 
vernacular Press, expressed great relief at the change 
and confidence in the early establishment of law and 
order under the beneficent direction of a constitutional 
Government. But if ever, when in disgrace with fortune, 
Yuan may have had misgivings as to the wisdom and 
patriotism of his own policy, his august shade had not 
long to wait by the Yellow Springs of Hades to see them 
amply justified, and his words fulfilled concerning the 
need for benevolent despotism and the evils of govern- 
ment under a " rampant democracy." The late Dictator 
had not been dead a month before it became apparent 
at Peking that only a strong hand of absolute authority 
could hope to impose a stable government upon the 
conflicting policies and ambitions of the semi-independent 
military chieftains and amateur politicians who now 
aspired to rule the country. Many experienced observers 
had foreseen that the substitution of the Dictator's rule 
for that of a number of jealous provincial governors 
would mean chaos, and they were right. 

With Yuan passed the last of the super-mandarins of 
the old regime and the last hope of an early restoration 
of stable government in China. 



CHAPTER III 

CHINA JOINS IN THE WORLD WAR 

The passing of Yuan left the Central Government's 
finances in a parlous state and the administration com- 
pletely disorganised. A month before his death the 
Government banks at Peking had suspended specie pay- 
ments and the military leaders were fiercely clamouring 
for money. Tuan Chi-jui and the new Cabinet formed 
at the end of June, containing representatives of all 
parties, hoped to restore the fiscal machinery by convening 
the ParUament of 1913 for August i and by other measures 
calculated to conciliate the Kuo-Min tang leaders. The 
Cantonese section, however, showed no signs of willing- 
ness to co-operate with the new Government. On July 8 
Admiral Li Ting-hsin published a manifesto at Shanghai, 
in which he declared that the Navy was determined to 
prevent the domination of the country by the militarists 
and monarchists who still controlled the administration ; 
behind the Navy was Tang Shao-yi, who had been a 
staunch monarchist under the Manchus and one of Yuan 
Shih-k'ai's ablest lieutenants in the Chihli Viceroyalty, 
but now a leader of Kuangtung irreconcilables. Tang 
Shao-yi and his friends demanded the immediate revival 
of the Provisional Constitution drawn up by the Repub- 
lican leaders at Nanking in 1911. Tuan Chi-jui endeav- 
oured to win over this very able but fractious official by 
making him Minister for Foreign Affairs in the new 
Cabinet, but Tang declined the honour. The proceedings 
at the reopening of Parliament on August i showed clearly 
that the opposition of the Kuo-Min tang to Peking had 
not ended with the Monarchy, but that it would continue 

52 



CHINA JOINS IN THE WORLD WAR 53 

to be actively organised against the so-called Military 
Party and its leader, the Premier, Tuan Chi-jui. The 
Military Governors, on their side, who actually dominated 
the situation, were willing to give the ParUamentarians 
an opportunity of justifying their political existence, but 
they were frankly sceptical as to the utility of an institu- 
tion which in the past had confined its constructive states- 
manship to voting £600 a year to each of its members. 
From the outset it was clear that the life of the resusci- 
tated Parhament would depend upon the good pleasure 
of the Military Governors and upon funds being made 
available for the generous maintenance of their armies. 

For the remainder of the year the financial problem 
continued to be serious, though somewhat relieved by the 
increasingly satisfactory results of the Salt Gabelle under 
Sir Richard Dane. In the spring of 1917 the question of 
China's entering the war on the side of the Allies came to 
be seriously considered by the Chinese Cabinet. Tuan 
Chi-jui had for some time past been in favour of this 
course, because he realised that it would not only improve 
China's political position, and entitle her to a voice in 
the ultimate settlement of Far Eastern affairs, but that 
it would greatly alleviate the country's financial situa- 
tion. When, therefore, at the beginning of February, 
the U.S. Minister at Peking invited the Chinese Govern- 
ment to follow the example of the United States by 
formally protesting against the illegahty and barbarism 
of Germany's submarine campaign, and by severing 
diplomatic relations, the seed fell upon ground well pre- 
pared. On February 9 the Chinese Government replied 
to the German Note announcing the unHmited submarine 
campaign, by an energetic protest, and an intimation 
that if the protest were disregarded diplomatic relations 
would be broken off. But Tuan Chi-jui and his friends 
were not to have their undisputed way in this matter. 
As usual, the question became rapidly involved in a net- 
work of internal politics, in which German intrigue played 
no inconsiderable part and German money secured the 



54 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

support of a considerable faction. The result, as usual, 
was a Ministerial crisis, in which the President's and the 
Premier's views came into sharp conflict. Tuan Chi-jui's 
supporters, all for immediate and energetic action, were 
opposed by the President on the ground that the matter 
was one for the decision of Parliament ; their action was 
fiercely attacked and their motives impugned by the 
' German-subsidised Press. At the outset their position 
was somewhat weakened by the delay which took place 
in the severance of relations between the United States 
and Germany, and by the failure of the Allies to convey 
any collective intimation to China that her intervention 
in the war would be welcome. This deficiency was 
remedied, however, on February 28, when the Allied 
Ministers at Peking presented a memorandum to the 
Chinese Government expressing sympathy with its action 
in regard to Germany and promising, in the event of 
^ diplomatic relations being severed, to consider favourably 
the suspension of the Boxer indemnity payments and a 
revision of the Chinese Customs tariff. Germany, on her 
side, was spending money freely at several military head- 
quarters, and had offered to wipe out several outstanding 
financial claims against China, in the hope of avoiding a 
rupture. Tuan's Cabinet, after referring the matter to 
the political leaders at Peking and in the provinces, 
decided on March 2 to sever relations with Germany and 
to instruct the provincial authorities accordingly. Presi- 
dent Li Yuan-hung, however, declined to sign these 
instructions, whereupon Tuan Chi-jui resigned. But the 
majority of Parliament and nearly all the leading poli- 
ticians were against the President ; Tuan could also count 
upon the energetic support of the Military Governors. 
After twenty-four hours' reflection the President gave way, 
whereupon Tuan withdrew his resignation and proceeded 
to lay the facts of the situation before a meeting of 
representatives of both Houses of Parliament. On 
March 11 Parliament voted for the severance of relations 
with Germany. They were severed on the 14th, and on 



CHINA JOINS IN THE WORLD WAR 55 

the same date the German ships at Shanghai and Amoy 
were seized by the Chinese authorities. 

So far so good. But neither China nor the AlHes could 
hope to derive advantages from the steps thus taken 
commensurate with their importance unless and until 
they were carried to their logical conclusion by a declara- 
tion of war against the Central Powers. There was never 
any serious difference of opinion among the various 
political and mihtary factions at Peking as to the advisa- 
bility of China throwing in her lot with the Powers 
fighting against the menace of Prussian militarism. 
Differences of interests there undoubtedly were, and 
factional jealousies which became actually intensified by 
the prospect of a Central Government at Peking relieved 
of its most pressing financial burdens; but never any 
vital differences of principles or national policy. Despite 
the feverish activity of German propaganda, educated 
opinion throughout China had slowly but surely come to 
appreciate the objects and methods of German kultur and 
to regard them with repugnance. The Chinese people are 
accustomed, as the result of the many invasions and 
rebelHons that have ravaged their country, to the savageries 
of bandit warfare, to the looting of cities and the slaughter 
of unoffending citizens, but their history contains no 
record of cold-blooded barbarism to equal Germany's 
deliberate policy of ruthless warfare waged against 
civilians. Even more than by the sinking of neutral 
merchant ships, the literati were impressed by the 
Germans' violations of international law in Belgium, by 
their wholesale deportation of defenceless Belgians into 
captivity and forced labour; and all their humane and 
religious instincts were particularly outraged by the 
horrible callousness displayed by the Germans in their 
treatment of their dead. 

The Chinese Cabinet's war policy was, therefore, 
approved in principle by Parliament, and generally 
endorsed throughout the country, at the end of March. 
A conference of mihtary leaders held at Peking on April 26 



56 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

voted for an immediate declaration of war ; six days later 
the Cabinet passed a unanimous resolution to the same 
effect. On May lo the matter was brought up for debate 
in the Lower House of Parliament. The result showed 
clearly that, while there was no genuine opposition to the 
war, the Parliamentarians, with the President behind 
them, were determined to treat the question as an oppor- 
tunity for an attack upon Tuan Chi-jui and the military 
party. How far German threats and bribes were factors 
in this determination, remains necessarily a matter for 
conjecture, but both undoubtedly carried a certain amount 
of weight with the Opposition. On May 19 a resolution 
was adopted by Parliament declaring that, while not 
opposed to the entry of China into the war, the House 
would refuse to consider the question until the Cabinet 
had been reconstructed. In other words, the situation 
was to be determined, not by the merits of the national 
poHcy proposed, but by gratifying the envy and jealousy 
of politicians. All parties recognised quite clearly the 
moral and material advantages which the Chinese Govern- 
ment might expect to gain by declaring war on the Central 
Powers (the abolition of indemnity and loan interest pay- 
ments to Germany alone represented a sum of £6000 a 
day), but the Opposition, headed by the Kuo-Min tang, 
was not disposed to see those advantages secured by 
Tuan Chi-jui and the Military Governors without a 
struggle. 

The struggle accordingly took place. It involved in 
its three months' course the dismissal of Parliament by 
order of the Militar}'- Governors, the resignation of the 
President, and, finally, an abortive restoration of the 
Manchu dynasty and a comic-opera battle between 
Republican-Monarchists and the Monarchist-Republicans 
around and about the Forbidden City. Following imme- 
diately upon Parliament's demand for a reconstruction 
of the Cabinet, the President decided upon a new trial of 
strength with his masterful Premier. He proceeded to 
reconstruct the Cabinet by obtaining the resignation or 




A BUDDHIST PRIEST (PROVINCE OF CHEKIAXuJ. 



CHINA JOINS IN THE WORLD WAR 57 

by the dismissal of all its members except Tuan himself. 
But the Cabinet, thus reduced to one, adhered firmly to 
its position, and declined to renounce its policy ; it urged 
the President to dissolve Parliament, plainly hinting that 
the Military Governors, determined to secure the declara- 
tion of war, had no intention of leaving Peking until 
he had done so. On May 23 President Li (apparently 
supported by a section of the Military Party) took his 
courage in both hands and dismissed the Premier. Tuan 
announced his intention to defy the mandate, and pro- 
ceeded to confer with his friends at Tientsin. A week 
later the Military Governors of several provinces north of 
the Yangtsze declared their independence of the Central 
Government. The attitude of Vice-President Feng Kuo- 
Chang at this juncture was, as usual, one of benevolent 
neutrality, and the solution of the crisis seemed therefore 
to rest with General Chang Hsiin, the genial swashbuckler 
of Shantung, who had made a name for himself as a 
military Vicar of Bray under the Manchus and during 
the revolution. In the south. Sun Yat-sen, Tang Shao-yi, 
and other Kuo-Min tang leaders were loudly denouncing 
Tuan and his supporters as exponents of militarism, and 
calling on all patriots to rally to the defence of Parliament 
and the people's liberties. Their voice was the voice of 
Young China, but too often there was reason to believe 
that the unseen hand was the insidious hand of Potsdam's 
agents in partibus. 

The Military Governors, after accusing the President 
and Parliament of trying to destroy the responsible 
Cabinet system, cut short further argument about con- 
stitutional principles by nominating a Provisional Govern- 
ment of their own at Tientsin, with Hsii Shih-chang (an 
amiable septuagenarian, ex-guardian of the Manchu heir- 
apparent) cast for the dummy role of Dictator. President 
Li's position had now become difficult and dangerous. 
General Nieh, Military Governor of Anhui, defined it 
succinctly by stating that he would be allowed to retain 
office only on condition of submitting to the Military Party 



58 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

and dissolving Parliament. He added, with curious 
frankness, that if General Chang Hsiin went to Peking, it 
would not be to make peace between President and 
Premier, but to restore the Manchus. On June 12, 
Chang Hsiin arrived at the capital, preceded by a " body- 
guard " of several thousand men. He came ostensibly as 
mediator, but it was observed that his troops proceeded 
to occupy the Fengtai railway junction and other strategic 
points. His mediation proved rapidly effective : on the 
day after his arrival the President dissolved Parliament by 
mandate. 

No sooner had Chang Hsiin emerged as the central 
figure on the stage than there were signs of trouble and 
dissension between him and certain of his colleagues in 
the Military Party. At this juncture, the question of 
declaring war against Germany was temporarily relegated 
by common consent to the background of practical politics ; 
public attention became completely engrossed in the clash 
of personal ambitions at Peking. Tuan Chi-jui remained 
at Tientsin watching events; a new Premier had been 
elected by Parliament (Li Ching-hsi, a son of Li Hung- 
chang), but so far he had declined to assume office and 
seemed rather disposed to support the action of that 
section of the Military Party which demanded the rein- 
statement of Tuan. The leaders of the Kuo-Min tang 
in the dissolved Parliament had made haste to depart for 
the South, where the Press was proclaiming an irreparable 
breach with the North, and the Navy, manned chiefly by 
southerners, made no secret of its intention to oppose 
Peking and the Military Governors. 

This tangled situation was rendered still more com- 
plicated, and the President's anti-war policy temporarily 
strengthened, by a Note handed to the Chinese Govern- 
ment by the American Minister at Peking on June 6, 
in which the U.S. Government deplored the growth 
of internal dissensions in China and intimated that the 
restoration of national unity and a stable administration 
was even more important than the declaration of war by 



CHINA JOINS IN THE WORLD WAR 59 

China against Germany. This advice was morally justi- 
fied, no doubt, by the facts of the situation ; nevertheless, 
it had several obviously weak points which made it 
politically unsound. In the first place, it conflicted 
sharply with the advice tendered from Washington only 
two months before ; in the second, it was calculated (as 
a Renter message from Tokyo promptly observed) to 
accentuate the existing party strife at Peking, for the 
reason that the President's faction would naturally regard 
it as an intimation that the U.S. Government was opposed 
to the policy of Premier Tuan and his adherents. A 
considerable section of public opinion in Japan regarded 
this Note as unjustifiable under the circumstances and 
likely to do more harm than good. The fact that, since 
his accession to power as Premier, Tuan Chi-jui's policy 
had been framed and carried out in close touch with 
Japan, was a factor in the situation that could not be 
ignored : it was, indeed. Young China's chief political 
reason for denouncing him and his military supporters. 
Everything justifies the assumption that Tuan's policy 
in this matter was largely due to his intelligent observa- 
tion of the causes that had contributed to the downfall 
of Yuan Shih-k'ai, and to the prudent advice of Liang 
Ch'i-ch'ao — to recognition, in fact, of Japan's predominant 
position in the Far East and of her material interests in 
China. Sun Yat-sen and his friends of the Kuo-Min tang 
had frequently recognised that position and those interests, 
when it suited them to do so, in the past, and most notably 
when they sought and obtained material assistance from 
Japan in the revolution of 1911. This, however, did not 
prevent them now from denouncing Tuan Chi-jui as a tool 
of the Government at Tokyo and accusing him of having 
made a secret agreement prejudicial to China with Japan, 
as the price of her support for the military-monarchist 
party. 

The " mediation " of General Chang Hsiin, as events 
proved, was not intended to promote either the policy of 
the President or that of the Premier. There was German 



60 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

money behind him, no doubt, and had his coup de main 
been successful, there would have been little prospect of 
China's joining the Allies ; but his immediate object was 
the restoration of the Manchu dynasty in the form of a 
Regency administered by himself as Viceroy of Chihli. 
During the eighteen days that elapsed between the arrival 
of his advance guard at the Temple of Heaven and his 
proclamation of the restoration of the Dragon Throne 
(July i). General Chang Hsiin continued to mediate, for 
form's sake, with the President. The result of these 
pourparlers was that, by June 24, Li Ching-hsi had agreed 
to assume the^ Premiership for three months, and the 
President had consented to a conservative re-drafting of 
the Constitution, a considerable restriction of his own 
powers, and the election of a new Parliament with reduced 
membership. These things being settled, the Military 
Governors of Honan, Shantung, ChihH, and Fengtien 
agreed to withdraw their troops and rescind their declara- 
tion of independence. Things seemed to be shaping 
towards an amicable settlement in accordance with the 
wishes of the Military Party; but, as a matter of fact, 
every inn-keeper and muleteer in Peking knew that some- 
thing more important than these face-saving negotiations 
was afoot, and that the Son of Heaven, after five years' 
dignified detachment in the profound seclusion of his 
palace, was about to be brought back, and the Dragon 
Throne restored to its ancient pride of place. There is no 
possible doubt that the restoration of the Manchu dynasty 
as a Constitutional Monarchy had been discussed and 
approved by the Military Governors, including Tuan 
Chi-jui, at their several conferences at Hsii-chou-fu in 
1916; the failure of Chang Hsiin's colleagues to support 
him and the restored Throne in July 1917, was not due 
to any Republican sjnnpathies on their part, but solely 
to the fact that Chang Hsiin, a blunt, ambitious soldier 
and no politician, had stolen a march on his associates 
and could by no means be permitted to reap the fruits 
thereof. More than one of the dignitaries who pledged 



CHINA JOINS IN THE WORLD WAR 61 

themselves to support the restoration of the Manchus has 
since admitted that the plot broke down because of 
General Chang's insistence on being rewarded with the 
Viceroyalty of Chihli, a post to which both Tuan Chi-jui 
and Tsao Kun aspired. 

His Majesty, the boy Hsiian Tung and the remnants of 
the Imperial Manchu family, in the tranquil recesses of 
the palace, had certainly no hand in the plot. When, 
after six days of brief eminence (more emphasised in the 
European and American Press than in his own capital), 
he returned once more to the enjoyment of the stately 
dignities and ceremonial etiquette of his Court without a 
kingdom, the triumphant " Republican " generals pub- 
lished a communication from the Emperor in the Peking 
Gazette, explaining that he, being only a boy, had been 
unable to prevent General Chang Hsiin from issuing edicts 
in his name, but that the authority of the House of Ching 
had been wrongfully invoked and abused. 

It was on July i that, following the precedent 
for similar coups d'etat established by Her Majesty the 
Empress Dowager Tzu-Hsi, General Chang Hsiin dragged 
the reluctant young Emperor from his bed at three 
o'clock in the morning. Forthwith the city bedecked 
itself with Dragon flags, by order of the pohce (the very 
fact that they were available gives cause for reflection), 
and within twenty-four hours the old order was peace- 
fully re-estabhshed. It has already been said that Chang 
Hsiin was no politician : he now proved it by a tactless 
assumption of supreme authority, conferring the highest 
honours in the land indiscriminately and without con- 
sulting the recipients, and by assuming that the Military 
Governors' avowed sympathy for the Monarchy would 
lead them to support it under his direction. Therein he 
erred, chiefly because (as The Times correspondent justly 
said) he himself was an " outsider," almost an accident, 
in the Councils of the Peiyang Military Party. Tuan 
Chi-jui now emerged from his retirement at Tientsin, and 
promptly put himself at the head of an army determined 



62 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

to vindicate the Republic and to " exterminate Chang 
Hsiin as a criminal and a robber." In this object he was 
supported by the Vice-President, Feng Kuo-chang, com- 
manding the Republican army of the south, and by other 
generals who, as a matter of common knowledge, had all 
been good, staunch monarchists a year before. Not with- 
out justice was Chang Hsiin's pathetic plaint for mediation 
addressed to the Foreign Ministers. When he found 
himself out-numbered and cornered, he said that, in 
restoring the Emperor to the Throne, he had acted in 
complete good faith, hoping to put a stop to the country's 
internal dissensions, and having every reason to expect 
support " from his pledged associates, with v/hom he was 
now forced to do battle." His troops realised, just as 
readily as their leader, that there was little advantage to 
be gained by endeavouring to maintain an untenable 
position ; the defence of the Monarchy was therefore half- 
hearted and desultory. On July 12 the defenders of the 
Imperial City capitulated, upon an amicable understand- 
ing that they were to receive three months' pay, money 
down. The total casualties, including a small number 
amongst the Legation Guards and foreign civilians, 
amounted to twenty-five killed and forty-five wounded. 
Before retiring upon his last position in the Imperial City, 
Chang Hsiin had asked the Foreign Legations to mediate, 
and had threatened, if pushed to extremities, to publish 
the minutes of one of the conferences at Hsiichow-fu, at 
which, he said, both Tuan Chi-jui and Feng Kuo-chang 
had promised to support the restoration of the Manchus. 
Chang Hsiin, after escaping to the refuge of the Dutch 
Legation, with the help of some of his Austrian friends, 
was permitted to retire into private life and left in enjoy- 
ment of his property.^ 

^ Since the collapse of the Anf u party last summer he has once 
more emerged, to play a prominent part in Peking politics, as 
friend and henchman of the great Chang Tso-lin, while Tuan 
Chi-jui takes his turn in prosperous and dignified retirement. In 
China, as in England, the fulminations of one party politician 
against another are usually stage thunder. 



CHINA JOINS IN THE WORLD WAR 63 

This semi-farcical restoration escapade proved in its 
conclusion to be a blessing in disguise, inasmuch as it 
expedited and facilitated the establishment of a strong 
Cabinet under Tuan Chi-jui (who now returned to resume 
the Premiership) and practically ensured the declaration 
of war by China against Germany. President Li Yuan- 
hung, who had fled for refuge to the Japanese Legation 
on the proclamation of the Monarchy, finally declined to 
resume a post for which he had never displayed any 
inclination or real fitness, and which Tuan Chi-jui triumph- 
ant would have made very uncomfortable for him. On 
July i8 it was announced, to the very general relief of 
those who feared further internal dissensions, that Vice- 
President General Feng Kuo-chang had agreed to accept 
the Presidency, and that he would co-operate in the policy 
of Premier Tuan. For some days it had also been feared 
that General Feng, an opportunist of the wait-and-see 
order, might elect to throw in his lot with Tuan's adver- 
saries, the Kuo-Min tang leaders, and the Navy in the 
south. The Kuo-Min tang had published a manifesto at 
Shanghai in which they declared themselves opposed to 
Tuan, for the same reason which had led them to favour 
his policy of war against Germany — ^namely, that they 
disliked all exponents and supporters of militarism. The 
Navy had issued a similar document, declaring the Govern- 
ment at Peking to be illegally constituted, and demanding 
the immediate convocation of Parliament. Had Feng 
Kuo-chang and his army taken sides with the southerners, 
Tuan Chi-jui 's chances of organising a Central Govern- 
ment would have been problematical. Observers on the 
spot had reason for grave misgivings on this score, because 
it was well known that, apart from the chronic jealousies 
that exist between the Peking and Nanking administra- 
tions, there had never been much love lost between 
Generals Tuan and Feng. 

The return to power of Tuan, practically in the position 
of a Dictator, made it certain that China's diplomatic 
rupture with Germany would now be followed by a 



64 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

declaration of war, involving not only the sequestration 
of German property and the internment or deportation 
of German subjects, but also the systematic uprooting of 
German financial and commercial interests throughout 
the country. It was not long before the Premier, having 
formed his Cabinet on conciliatory and moderate lines, 
gave evidence of his intentions in this matter. Having 
ascertained General Feng's willingness to accept the 
Presidency, he informed the Allied Ministers that, upon 
the latter 's arrival in Peking and assumption of office, 
the Cabinet would proceed to declare war ; in the mean- 
while, he intimated that it would greatly strengthen his 
hands if the Allied Powers, in fulfilment of their promises, 
would make a definite declaration of the financial and 
other advantages which they were prepared to concede 
to China. On more than one occasion since March, the 
representatives of Great Britain, Japan, and the United 
States had assured the Chinese Government that the Allies 
would treat China generously as regards the suspension 
of the Boxer indemnity and the revision of the Customs 
tariff ; and the Chinese, on their side, had expressed their 
readiness to declare war against Germany without making 
a specific bargain, relying upon the Allies' promise of fair 
treatment. Nevertheless, bearing in mind the number 
of Powers concerned in the indemnity question, and their 
possibly conflicting interests, it was only natural that 
Tuan and his supporters should desire, before taking the 
final and irrevocable step, to receive assurances of a kind 
that would give confidence to waverers and prevent 
effective criticism by their opponents. Owing chiefly to 
the situation in Russia, it was not possible for the Allied 
Governments, however well disposed, to come quickly to 
a common understanding in these matters. Recognising 
this fact, and being urged by the Japanese and British 
Governments to rely upon the good faith of the Allies, 
Tuan decided to face the risk of the Kuo-Min tang's 
opposition, and to proceed to declare war against the 
Central Powers. 



CHINA JOINS IN THE WORLD WAR Q5 

Feng Kuo-chang arrived in Peking on August i; his 
assumption of the Presidency greatly strengthened the 
position and prestige of the Central Government. A few 
days before, Sun Yat-sen and his extremist friends had 
issued a proclamation in Kuangtung, refusing to recog- 
nise orders from Peking and proposing that Parliament 
should meet under a Provisional Government at Canton ; 
but without men or money behind them, the fulminations 
of the Kuo-Min tang leaders might well be disregarded. 
The strength of Tuan's position in dealing with the southern 
revolutionary element and the professional agitators of 
Young China lay chiefly in his good understanding with 
the Japanese Government; for the first time since the 
Russo-Japanese War, the Central Government at Peking 
might confidently expect the Japanese authorities in 
China and Japan to discourage any further attempts at 
treasonable conspiracies and sedition in the central and 
southern provinces. In this assurance Tuan Chi-jui and 
his Cabinet proceeded, therefore, to carry out their policy, 
and on August 3 unanimously resolved on declaring war 
against the Central Powers. The formal declaration took 
place on August 14. 

Had it not been for the peculiar qualities of jealousy and 
intrigue which habitually dominate politics in Eastern 
countries, public opinion, so far as it exists in China, 
would undoubtedly have brought about the declaration 
of war at the same time, and for the same reasons, that 
the United States threw in her lot with the Allies. Internal 
politics intervened, as has been shown, to prevent this. 
To a certain extent it may be admitted that President 
Li Yuan-hung and those who supported his policy of 
neutrality were influenced by considerations of a prudent 
and patriotic nature, and unaffected by the atmosphere of 
intrigue, intimidation, and bribery which emanated from 
Germany's diplomatic, consular, financial, and secret- 
service agents. President Li himself, for example, was 
certainly much influenced by fear of the effects of the 
revolution in Russia, a fear which he frankly confessed, 

F 



66 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA ^^^C^ 

and which outweighed in his judgment the help which 
the Alhes might expect to receive from the United! States. 
But, broadly speaking, the opposition to President Tuan's 
war policy was due to German instigation, and maintained 
by a considerable expenditure of German money. 

The last manifestation of internal politics with which 
Tuan Chi-jui had to contend, viz. Chang Hsiin's coup 
d'etat, was undoubtedly " made in Germany." As events 
proved, however, it turned out to the advantage both of 
Premier Tuan and of the Allies, who desired to see China 
closed to the activities of German agents. So long as the 
President and the Premier at Peking were divided in 
counsel, there could be no hope of establishing anything 
in the nature of a strong Central Government, in which 
lay China's only hope of peaceful progress and stability. 
Chang Hsiin's blundering attempt to restore the Manchus 
enabled Tuan Chi-jui to make a fresh start, with every 
prospect of financial solvency and of assistance from the 
Powers best able to give the Central Government effective 
support, moral and material. 

By an agreement between the Consortium banks at 
Peking (excluding the German) it was arranged, upon 
China's declaration of war, that the Chinese Government 
should receive an immediate loan of 10,000,000 yen for 
general administrative purposes, secured against the Salt 
Gabelle revenues. The Chinese Government, having 
many claims to meet at home and abroad, would have 
liked to borrow on a much larger scale, but in their own 
interests they were advised that, with exchange at its then 
high level, it would be folly to do so. As the result of the 
war in Europe, and of China's participation therein, she 
was now placed in a financial position which, had it been 
wisely and honestly handled, would soon have enabled 
her to recover complete stabiUty. Her internal resources 
were increased and her foreign obligations reduced. 
Under these conditions, it was to be hoped that the Allies 
would agree to discourage the Chinese Government from 
any further dalliance on the primrose path of borrowing, 





<^^ili> 



B. T. Prideaux] 

ASCENDING THE RAPIDS, HWEI RIVER, CHEKIANG. 




B. T. Pndtaux 



A FISHERMAN OF THE WHANGPOO. 



I 



CHINA JOINS IN THE WORLD WAR 67 

and urge them to take advantage of the existing most 
favourable conditions to set their house in order and to 
make timely provision for emergencies, to tabulate and 
regulate all internal loans and financial claims ; above all, 
to take steps for the disbandment of irregular armed 
forces in the provinces and the centralisation of military 
authority in a national army under the Ministry of War. 
As will be shown hereafter, no matter how great the 
country's resources, they can never be sufficient for its 
needs so long as independent bodies of troops are allowed 
to levy taxes on their own account and to claim payment 
for making (or for not making) attacks on the established 
order of things. Coincident with the elimination of 
Germany, chief mischief-maker, China had an oppor- 
tunity, such as she had never enjoyed before, for working 
out her own salvation. She had a fair field and much 
favour ; a splendid and unexpected opportunity for prov- 
ing to the world, without let or hindrance, Young China's 
capacity for efficient self-determination and patriotic 
effort. But this opportunity has been lost, frittered away 
in futile strife, consumed by the greed and inefficiency of 
politicians of all professions, old and new. To what a 
state they have since brought the finances and adminis- 
tration of the country is matter of common knowledge. 



CHAPTER IV 

THE REPUBLIC OF TO-DAY 

During the winter of 1919-1920 I made a rapid journey 
through. North China, Manchuria, Korea, and Japan. The 
sole purpose of this journey was to investigate on the 
spot the changes brought about by the World War and by 
recent political events in these countries ; to discuss the 
situation in all its bearings with the men best qualified 
to take a broad-minded view of its facts and needs; 
and finally to offer, if possible, through the Press, some 
practical suggestions with a view to averting the immedi- 
ate dangers which threaten China from within and 
without. Beyond my duty to The Times and certain 
other newspapers, I had no mission, nor received any 
remuneration whatsoever, from any quarter. Having no 
political objects to serve, I may claim to have studied the 
situation, if not with impartiality, at least with complete 
independence, and to set forth the truth, as I see it, 
without fear or favour. But not without affection, for 
I must plead guilty to very sincere feeUngs of kindly 
S3niipathy for the long-suffering and lovable Chinese people, 
amongst whom the best years of my life have been spent. 

I make no apology for this personal statement, for the 
reason that the vernacular Press controlled by Young 
China at the Treaty Ports, and especially the organs of 
its irreconcilable malcontents at Canton, have been at 
pains to declare that my opinions on the situation were 
untrustworthy, because I was " in the paid service of a 
certain foreign Power whose militaristic policy is antago- 
nistic to the national aspirations of the Young China 
party " — meaning, thereby, Japan. Referring particu- 
larly to my views on the ever-thorny subject of centralised 

68 



1 



THE REPUBLIC OF TO-DAY 69 

finance, as reported at an interview in Shanghai, the 
Chung hita Pao characteristically observed that they 
were inspired by the hope of obtaining a lucrative post 
as financial controller at Peking. Scurrilous falsehoods 
of this kind are unfortunately common currency amongst 
the hot-headed and half-educated youths who now claim 
to represent and guide public opinion in China; and 
one cannot afford to ignore them entirely, because the 
utterances of these journals, which live by and for agita- 
tion and sedition, are widely circulated abroad, by means 
of the " Asiatic News Agency," and thus achieve a 
fictitious importance, especially in the United States. 
On my return from the East, via America, I found at 
San Francisco unmistakable evidence of the far-reaching 
iivfluence of this poisonous Press work. 

The wrath of the Cantonese politicians and of their 
jackals of the Press was aroused on this occasion by the 
pubhc expression of my firm belief — a belief which is now 
widely shared by responsible Chinese and foreigners 
throughout the East — ^that, unless a way can be found 
to make the provinces sink their differences and unite in 
patriotic support of a centralised government, nothing 
but international control of the country's finances can 
save China from bankruptcy and disruption. I had also 
declared my conviction that nothing had done more to 
prevent the restoration of political equilibrium of law 
and order, under a strong central authority, than the 
ascendancy in public affairs of the student class, and 
particularly that undiscipUned section of it which com- 
bines crude ideas of Republicanism with a smattering 
of Western science. To any one who is not blinded 
by sentimental delusions or self-interest, the course of 
events during the past five years has brought home the 
obvious fact that unless a stable and effective government 
can be established speedily at Peking, foreign control of 
China's finances is inevitable, in China's own interest. 
And since the passing of Yuan Shih-k'ai, the hope of 
establishing such a government has become more remote 



70 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

with each passing year. The vision of a New China, 
regenerate and invigorated by means of democratic 
institutions, so widely proclaimed after the triumph of 
the revolution, was a delusion for which the Chinese 
were less to blame than the foreigners in their midst, 
who inspired and encouraged it. That vision was bound 
to prove a mirage, for the simple reason that the instinct 
and capacity for representative government is still 
lacking in the Chinese people. 

Since it is the Cantonese section of Young China which 
is ever loudest and most insistent in proclaiming its own 
virtues and detnanding sympathy for its political pro- 
grammes, let us cast a passing glance at the present 
condition of the two Kuang provinces, those fruitful 
breeding-grounds of unrest and rebellion, and, lest we be 
charged with prejudice in the matter, let us take the 
evidence of a Cantonese observer, who has described the 
situation in a recent contribution to the North China 
Herald (October 2, 1920). The story which he tells, an 
Oriental version of the tale of the Kilkenny Cats, might 
be told with equal force of many other provinces, for at 
present there are five uncrowned kings fighting for the 
mastery in China. But the Cantonese leaders of Young 
China, the highly vocal Americanised section which has 
produced men like Tang Shao-yi, Sun Yat-sen, Wen 
Tsung-yao, and Wellington Koo, insist so eloquently 
upon the glorious future which awaits their country 
(under their guidance) when a lawfully-elected Parlia- 
ment gets to work under the right kind of Constitution, 
that the present condition of the people in Kuangtung 
and Kuangsi is particularly deserving of attention. For 
at Canton the Republicans and the Reformers, the 
Parliamentarians and Constitution-makers, have had 
practically a free hand since Yuan expelled them and the 
Kuo-Min tang from Peking. When Canton became a 
law unto herself, those staunch Republicans, Wu Ting- 
fang, Sun Yat-sen, and Tang Shao-yi, had a chance of 
proving to a sympathetic world that, here at least, it 



THE REPUBLIC OF TO-DAY 71 

was possible for the Chinese to organise a system of 
representative government based on honest administra- 
tion. Theirs was the opportunity, while all the world 
was at war, of proving, by practical performance, that 
capacity for efficient self-government which they had so 
often asserted on the platform and in the Press; this 
was the time to justify their demand for the abolition 
of extra-territoriality, by an object-lesson of wise and 
honest administration. What the actual results of their 
leadership have been, may be told in the words of the 
Cantonese writer : 

" To put the whole subject in a nutshell, the Kuang- 
tung troops under General Chen, who, by the way, is 
himself a Cantonese, are trying their utmost to evict the 
Kuangsi-ites. General Chen — Hke General Tan Yen-kai, 
the Hunan General who was successful in driving out 
the bandit chief, Chang Chin-yao, from Hunan, and thus 
secured the freedom of his province — is trying to free his 
fellow-provincials from despotism, and thus make way 
for self-government and liberty. 

" Kuangtung, which has always been reputed to be 
the most progressive and most prosperous province in 
China, is alleged to have been reduced to poverty and to 
a state of debt amounting to not less than $50,000,000, 
simply because of the misrule, the avarice, the corruption, 
and the incompetency of the Kuangsi party in Kuangtung, 
in spite of the fact that they have bled the province of 
every cash by all kinds of illegal methods. 

" Since their entry into Kuangtung under the cloak of 
' defenders of the Constitution,' the Kuangsi militarists, 
numbering more than 50,000 troops, are said to have 
imposed illegal taxes, licensed disorderly and gambling 
houses, forced the planting of poppy, allowed the smug- 
gling of opium and the selling and smoking of the drug, 
permitted the smuggling of arms by robber bands, and 
so forth. Well-tried officials have been removed from 
office, and where one competent man was enough in 
former days, fifty incompetent men are used nowadays 
— all hangers-on of the Kuangsi party. And, moreover, 
the salary of one official in former days is multiplied not 
less than thirty times under the rule of Kuangsi. Archives 



72 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

precious to the hearts of the Cantonese are said to have 
been stolen. The machinery from the Arsenal and the 
Mint has been removed. The funds of the Treasury are 
missing. Books of the public libraries have been taken 
away and the shelves are left bare. All has been taken 
away. Where? — ^To Kuangsi. 

" Progressive enterprises have been interfered with. 
Government schools have not received their annual 
appropriations, and many were thus forced to close. 
Civil affairs, which were left in the hands of a few military 
men, were forced to go begging, while military expenditure 
— not to mention troops — has increased by leaps and 
bounds. Newspapers were closed simply because they 
voiced public opinion. Editors were taken out and sum- 
marily shot without being accorded a hearing and without 
being allowed to defend themselves or to secure the 
services of legal counsel to defend them — and there are 
supposed to be law courts in the province. The district 
of Kinchow was cut off from Kuangtung and annexed to 
Kuangsi in spite of the protests of the Cantonese. 

" All of these misdeeds have occurred since the break- 
up of the Military Government. General Tsen Chun- 
hsiian, who was the only member of the Military Govern- 
ment left in Canton, joined with Lu Yung-ting against 
the Cantonese people, who have always followed the 
leadership of Dr. Sun Yat-sen. In order that he might 
gain the sympathy of the Cantonese, he enlisted the 
services of Mr. Wen Tsung-yao, a Cantonese of&cial in 
the north, and a man full of promise, and Dr. Chen Chin- 
tao, former Minister of Finance, to aid him. Wen and 
Chen were only tools, however, in the hands of the 
militarists, who remained as arrogant as ever. 

" The problem of the Cantonese, therefore, was to 
drive out of their province Generals Tsen and Mu Yung- 
hsien, the latter being the Kuangsi Tuchun of Kuangtung, 
as well as Wen and Chen, and to rid the province of the 
Kuangsi bandit-troops. Once this was done, Kuangsi 
influence in the province would have been broken. 

" The next problem of the Cantonese, after regaining 
their province, is to defeat the Kuangsi-ites in their own 
province and drive out Lu Yung- ting, the bandit Inspector- 
General who is responsible for all the trouble. Unless 
this man is driven from power, they will constantly be 
in danger of his recovering strength and attacking them 



THE REPUBLIC OF TO-DAY 73 

once more. With this bandit in power there can be no 
peace in China, say the Cantonese. He will ever remain 
a thorn in their side. 

" It might be mentioned that although neither ' side ' 
has a dollar, some of the individual Kuangsi-ites have 
amassed fortunes amounting to millions of dollars. Lu 
Yung-ting is said to have some $30,000,000 buried in the 
earth in his village near Nanning, Kuangsi. In his 
peace proposals he has openly stated that he is willing to 
make any kind of peace provided he be allowed to keep 
these ill-gotten gains." 



Now, the men who are chiefly responsible for this state 
of affairs (which, in greater or less degree, now prevails 
throughout China) are the professional politicians who 
came to the front at the time of the revolution — ^the 
men whose message, proclaimed to the ends of the earth, 
declared that, when once the Republic was established, 
a new era of peace and progress would dawn and China 
take her rightful place among the great nations. It is 
important to remember this, because to-day a new 
generation of Young China is coming to the front, pro- 
fessing the same lofty aims and patriotic fervour as those 
which distinguished the utterances of Sun Yat-sen and 
his revolutionary colleagues, and once more we are asked 
to believe that, if only their hands can be strengthened 
and their plans fulfilled, all will be well with China. 
" Let only the Dragon Throne be abolished," said Young 
China in 1911, " and we will show you how the country 
should be governed." To-day the dramatis personce have 
changed, but the play is ever the same. " Let only 
the Militarist Government be abolished," says Young 
China; "only give us a chance to show what govern- 
ment should be, and all will be well." But to look for 
salvation from this quarter, to believe in a Chinese world 
suddenly made free for democracy, one must find justi- 
fication for the belief that the Western-learning student 
of to-day is likely to bring to the conduct of public 
affairs a mind and methods different from those of his 



74 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

immediate predecessors. What grounds are there for 
any such behef ? 

As a matter of fact. Young China, being highly intel- 
Hgent, knows very well that the root of the trouble in 
China is in no sense militarism; the catchword has 
been adopted from Europe by the politicians in order to 
invest a very sordid struggle with some semblance of 
moral purpose. Men of the class of C. T. Wang and 
Wellington Koo are perfectly well aware of the fact that 
such Government as exists in China to-day is conducted 
not on mihtarist, but on purely mercenary principles. 
They know that the " Constitutional " battle-cry of the 
" Outs " is the emptiest make-believe, and that there 
has never been any real difference of pohtical principles 
at issue between the warring factions, north or south, 
east or west. They know that those who administer the 
Government at Peking and in the provinces are merely 
groups of predatory officials, true to type in the matter 
of " squeeze," but far more rapacious than of old, 
because of the absence of the restraining authority of 
the Throne. 

Let us face the simple truth, which Young China's 
record of the past eight years has repeatedly emphasised, 
namely, that one thing, and one thing only, prevents 
the establishment of a stable Central Government at 
Peking, and this is the insatiable greed of money which 
possesses every Chinese who attains to public office. 
Take, for example, the record of the so-called Repubhcan 
leaders who came to the front in 1911. Those who rose 
to high office as Tuchuns, speedily proved that a man- 
darin by any other name is still a mandarin. Almost 
without exception they proceeded to amass great fortunes 
at all costs and all speed. In the words of the North 
China Daily News (always a well-disposed observer), 
" Chinese officialdom under the so-called democracy has 
become more irresponsible and more flagrantly venal 
than ever before. Its special activities have been 
directed to the business of recruiting private forces with 



THE REPUBLIC OF TO-DAY 75 

public money and of selling the power thus acquired to 
the highest bidder." Thus in China, as in Russia and 
Mexico, we see once more the truth demonstrated that 
the type of a social structure can never be changed by 
a political revolution. As Spencer says, " Out of the 
nominally free government set up, a new despotism arises, 
differing only from the old by having a new shibboleth 
and new men to utter it, but identical with the old in 
the determination to put down opposition and in the 
means used to this end." 

Young China to-day, as in 1911, loudly proclaims its 
patriotic integrity of purpose and capacity for honest 
work in the public service; but the fact remains (and 
the Chinese themselves admit it) that it is not possible 
to name a dozen men in all the ranks of the bureaucracy, 
old or new, whose record would command implicit 
confidence in the matter of disinterested, clean-handed 
administration. It is because of the lack of such men, 
and the impossibility of reorganising a stable Government 
without them, that the great majority of patriotic, non- 
ofhcial Chinese have come to the conclusion that the 
country's best chance of regaining stability and security 
lies in placing the national finances, as a whole, under 
some form of foreign supervision. And the machinery 
for this supervision is already in existence ; all that is 
required is gradually to extend the system of adminis- 
tration which has proved so beneficial as applied to the 
Maritime Customs, the Salt Gabelle, and the Postal 
Service. 

During my recent visit to China, I discussed this 
question with officials of all classes, with those in ofhce 
and those in comfortable retirement, with leading repre- 
sentatives of the serious-minded section of Young China, 
with merchants, bankers, and scholars ; and everywhere, 
from the immediate vicinity of the Presidential mansion 
at Peking to the guilds and compradores of the Treaty 
Ports, I found a very general recognition of the truth 
that, left to itself, the country does not possess sufficient 



76 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

elements of constructive statesmanship to put an end to 
the chaos and corruption now prevailing. Amongst the 
highest officials at the capital and in the provinces, many 
were prepared to admit, in private conversation, that in 
foreign intervention lies China's only hope of putting an 
end to the pernicious activities of the political adven- 
turers and freebooters who have made of civil war a 
lucrative industry. The list which I could make of the 
men who have confessed to this belief would be interesting 
and instructive. It cannot be published, however, for, 
since the students at Peking expressed their dissatis- 
faction with the; Versailles Treaty last May by burning 
the house of Tsao Ju-lin and insisting on his dismissal 
from the Cabinet, officialdom goes in deadly fear of 
openly opposing their political opinions. One of the 
most marked characteristics of the Chinese is their 
extraordinary readiness to submit to intimidation by 
their own countrymen. It is a characteristic which, in 
the case of Peking's officials, has been intensified by the 
elimination of the Throne as a rallying-point for authority, 
and also by their natural anxiety, as rich men, to incur 
no avoidable risks, in a world full of perils of change. 
Let but the yamens be disturbed by whisperings of some 
new plot, such as General Chang Hsiin's escapade of 
1917, and straightway long lines of carts, laden with 
the portable wealth of the mandarins, make their way 
from the houses of the great to the refuge of the 
banks and battlements of the Legation quarter. In 
the natural timidity of the officials and merchants lies 
the real secret of much of the extraordinary influence 
of the student class in China to-day. And the student 
knows it. 

The increasing authority of the student class as a 
factor in the poHtics of the Republic is a phenomenon in 
itself as significant as the unparalleled wealth accumu- 
lated by the official class during the past eight years, 
while Europe and Japan have been besieged for loans 
by the Government drifting ever nearer and nearer to 



i 



THE REPUBLIC OF TO-DAY 77 

bankruptcy. Both are symptomatic of the demoraUsa- 
tion which became inevitable when, with the central 
authority, Young China cast off the ethical restraints and 
moral discipUne of the Confucian regime; when, as 
the result of " Western learning " on the younger genera- 
tion, parental authority — ^the very bed-rock of Chinese 
civiHsation — lost something of its time-honoured sanctity 
in the eyes of the young men who claimed to lead public 
opinion. 

Even before the Revolution, the overweening conceit, 
the undisciplined and nervous excitabihty, of the foreign- 
educated student had led many competent observers to 
wonder whether the wine of the new learning, so freely 
dispensed and rapidly imbibed, would prove to be a 
healthy stimulant or a dangerous intoxicant, whether 
the younger generation would have patriotism and 
patience enough to build up on the old foundations a 
new system of government acceptable and intelligible to 
the masses of their countrymen. After the passing of 
the Manchus and the inauguration of parliamentary 
procedure at Peking, it soon became apparent, to all 
who were not perversely blinded to the truth, that 
Young China had changed its old lamps for new, but that 
neither the wick of wisdom nor the oil of honesty was 
forthcoming. The whole record of the parliamentarians 
and professional pohticians of the new dispensation during 
the past eight years has been a welter of sordid con- 
spiracies, of corruption and party factions, unredeemed by 
any genuine manifestation of constructive statesmanship 
or self-denying patriotism. Western learning has, of 
course, produced a small number of men, both in the 
last generation and in the present, who combine great 
intellectual gifts with high moral qualities, but the fact 
remains that it is not possible for these men, if they 
become officials, either to exact or to practise strict 
honesty in public life. Nor is it possible for them to 
impart to the poHtically unconscious masses about 
them the inspiration of democratic institutions, the 



78 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

communal culture of our European civilisation. What 
was true of men like Wu Ting-fang and Tang Shao-yo in 
1911, is true of C. T. Wang, S. G. Cheng, and Wellington 
Koo to-day. 

The Young China of to-day, and especially the irre- 
concilable faction of the so-called Southern Government, 
professes its fervent belief in the regenerative virtue of 
democratic institutions, and particularly of parliaments 
and constitutions, just as it did in the days when Sun 
Yat-sen clamoured for the abolition of the Manchus. 
And to-day, as then, its views derive much of their 
importance abroad and influence in China from the fact 
that the section of European and American opinion 
which is identified with, and chiefly responsible for, this 
belief, continues to encourage it. Most missionary 
societies continue to assure Young China Militant that 
liberalism abroad sympathises with its theories and 
sanctions its practices. Many missionaries, it is true, 
are beginning to express grave doubts as to the future. 
Even the bhndest of honest enthusiasts can hardly shut 
his eyes to the mass of tares and wild oats that have 
sprung up in the field so carefully sown. The pious 
aspirations of platform patriotism can hardly outweigh 
such things as the officially organised traffic in native- 
grown opium, or the unblushing venality and profligacy 
of the parliamentary delegates at Peking and Canton, 
which has become a byword among the Chinese them- 
selves. 

Nevertheless, there are, as I have said, those who not 
only advocate encouragement of the student movement, 
but who profess to see in its emotional and undisciphned 
activities the long-deferred awakening of the Chinese 
people to the dawn of democracy. They forget that the 
foreign-educated Chinese student has indulged in these 
same emotional qualities, this passion for fierce rhetoric, 
fiag-waving, and solemn processions, for at least a quarter 
of a century. They overlook, moreover, the deeply 
significant fact that whereas Young China will work 



THE REPUBLIC OF TO-DAY 79 

itself to a semi-hysterical condition of eloquence and 
tears over China's sovereign rights in the Shantung case, 
its indignation has never yet been publicly directed 
against the growing rapacity of the metropolitan and 
provincial officials or the notorious corruption of both 
parliaments. Those who profess belief in the possibihty 
of China's regeneration at the hands of the present 
generation of students, are, no doubt, in certain cases, 
sincere. Amongst missionaries there are many en- 
thusiasts whose opinion is entitled to respect because of 
that sincerity ; but those who have studied the student 
movement closely, know that most of its political acti- 
vities are instigated and guided by the professional 
poUtician. The raw youths and schoolgirls who periodi- 
cally parade the streets of Shanghai, Tientsin, and Peking, 
demanding the execution of the Chiefs of Pohce or 
denouncing negotiations with Japan, may convey to 
the uninitiated observer a new and vivid impression of 
patriotic national consciousness, but those behind the 
scenes are well aware that all this fervour and ferment 
of turbulent youth is often skilfully stimulated by the 
opponents of the official clique in power at Peking for 
their own sordid ends. In the case of the student out- 
break last winter at Tientsin, for instance, there is no 
doubt (I have seen documentary evidence of the fact) 
that the anti-Japanese processions and demonstrations 
were dehberately organised by paid agents, with a view 
to embarrassing, and, if possible, overthrowing, the 
Cabinet at Peking. The actual funds employed (some 
$200,000) were traced to the estate of the late President, 
General Feng Kuo-chang, who died in possession of a 
vast fortune and a deep, unsatisfied grudge against his 
Prime Minister, Tuan Chi-jui. In the present state of 
Chinese pohtics, the fact that Tuan and his adherents 
were maintained in power (at a price) by Japan, was 
quite enough to account for much of the fervour dis- 
played by the Government's opponents on the subject of 
Shantung. Incidentally, it may be observed that the 



80 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

Shantung agitation has not been in any true sense a 
national, or even a provincial, movement. This, I think, 
is sufficiently proved by the fact that, in Manchuria, 
the Chinese — practically all Shantung men — ^have never 
organised any boycott or other manifestation of hostility 
towards the Japanese. 

To every impartial observer the truth is apparent that 
neither the Shantung question, nor the far wider problem 
of Japanese political ascendancy at Peking, can ever be 
satisfactorily settled until the warring factions of the 
" Ins " and " Outs " cease from their sordid strife and 
unite in supporting a Central Government, be it what it 
may. And it is because nothing in the present attitude 
of these factions justifies any hope of such a solution in 
the near future, that all those who reaUse the dangers of 
the situation also reahse the necessity for measures of 
foreign financial control. In China's own interest the 
friendly Powers will have to insist upon measures by 
which the authority of the Central Government may 
gradually be re-established. In no other way can the 
world's most venerable civilisation be brought safely 
through its present perils to self-reliant independence 
and prosperity. 

As matters stand in China to-day, it is more con- 
spicuously evident than it was in 191 1, that the ascen- 
dancy of Young China offers no hope of establishing a 
strong Central Government based on principles intelligible 
to the masses, and that, until such a Government is 
established, the present chaos of corruption and civil 
strife will continue. Eight years ago, when I lectured 
on the subject of China in the United States, most people 
were inclined to regard opinions of this kind as unin- 
spired pessimism. The Press and public were generally 
content to form their opinion of China and the Chinese 
on the pohshed platitudes of men Uke Wu Ting-fang and 
Tang Shao-yi, diplomats in whom the Oriental faculty 
for tactful blandishment has been rendered more than 
usually effective by their foreign University education. 



THE REPUBLIC OF TO-DAY 81 

The enthusiastic, intelligent, and apparently adaptable 
young men who came flocking from China to American 
colleges in ever-increasing numbers after 1900, seemed to 
justify bright hopes for the future, especially as they all 
expressed profound admiration for American institutions 
and ideals of government. But China's experience of 
the past eight years must have convinced every impartial 
observer — ^it has certainly convinced the Chinese them- 
selves — that as it was under the Manchus so it is under 
the Republic : money remains the be-all and end-all of 
politics. It still remains emphatically true, that ninety 
per cent, of the masses, in whose name Young China 
professes to speak, are illiterate ; equally true, that they 
care nothing whether their rulers call themselves Emperors 
or Presidents, so long as they rule in accordance with 
the nation's time-honoured traditions. It is also true 
to-day, as it was under the Manchus, that, with the 
exception of the small Western-learning class, the edu- 
cated minority of the population, following the Confucian 
teaching, remains profoundly indifferent to politics. 
Patriotic they are, no doubt, in the sense that they love 
their birthplace with a deep-rooted attachment, cherish 
a deep pride of race, and can be aroused to swift mani- 
festations of hatred against the foreigner, when con- 
vinced that either their native soil or their immemorial 
customs are endangered by the alien invader. But 
Chinese patriotism, beyond the small circle of the pro- 
fessional politician, finds no expression in manifestations 
of public spirit or nationalistic feeling. It is safe to say 
that the agricultural masses of the population are far 
more concerned to-day with the illegal levies and taxes 
exacted from them by their self-appointed Republican 
rulers, than with the Shantung question or any of the 
alleged political differences between North and South. 
All they ask, these patient, toiling millions, is a Govern- 
ment that shall so order things that a man may enjoy 
the fruits of his labour in peace; a Government whose 
necessities and rapacities shall not exceed the limits 

G 



82 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

prescribed by centuries of established custom. They 
were told, when the Son of Heaven passed into obscurity, 
that a Republic meant peace and prosperity, less work 
and less taxes ; they have learned, during eight years 
of sack and pillage, that, Manchus or no Manchus, Hfe 
and property were safer under the Dragon flag than they 
are to-day. They have learned that the new type of 
mandarin, in his strange, foreign clothes, has nothing to 
learn from the old (unless it be restraint) in the arts and 
crafts of " squeeze." And the scorpions of the new 
dispensation are harder to bear than the whips of the old, 
because every YamSn has become a law unto itself, 
against which there is no appeal. 

There are those who, while admitting these truths, 
still pin their faith to the rising generation of Young 
China, to the student class which has not yet attained 
public office, but perceives that the shortest road thereto 
lies through the platform and the Press. To these, I 
would merely observe that China's situation is too 
critical to permit of further experiments just at present ; 
also that, even if a few sincerely honest officials were 
forthcoming, they could do nothing to stem the tide of 
wholesale " squeeze " now running. I would go further, 
however, and assert that the instinct which impels the 
Chinese to put money in his purse whenever and however 
he can, is no more capable of being eradicated in one or 
two generations than the colour of his skin. It is an 
instinct, deep-rooted in the structural character of the 
race, a direct product of a struggle for existence far more 
severe (because rigorously localised for centuries) than 
anything in the history of European nations. And 
nothing can possibly mitigate the fierceness of this 
struggle, no political institutions can ever modify the 
qualities and defects which it produces, so long as the 
social system of the Chinese continues to make philo- 
progenitiveness a rehgious duty. Ancestor-worship, 
combined with the polygamous, patriarchal family 
system, have produced a state of society in which 




B. T. Prideaux] 



UNMARRIED GIRLS OF THE MIDDLE CLASS (SHANGHAI), 
SUMMER COSTUME. 



THE REPUBLIC OF TO-DAY 83 

every man will, if he can, raise himself and his imme- 
diate posterity above the level of the masses, for ever 
struggling for the bare necessities of existence. Turn to the 
pages of the Old Testament, and observe how the instinct 
for acquiring wealth is recognised and sanctioned as a 
dominant characteristic of the Oriental mind. To-day 
in China, as it was in the days of Solomon, " the rich 
man's wealth is his strong city," and " money answereth 
all things." It is true to-day, as it was in the days of 
Babylon, that " a man's gift maketh room for him and 
bringeth him before great men." By no process of 
exhortation can the mandarin's incorrigible greed of 
gain be eradicated; its motive force lies deep in the 
unrecorded ages of the past. Looking at things in this 
light, we may understand why the bribery and cor- 
ruption of the official class in China arouse no more 
indignation under the RepubUc than they did under the 
Manchus. And finally, one has only to reaUse how 
irresistible a temptation besets the mandarin, whether 
old or new, in the big-scale proposals of foreign 
financiers and concession-seekers, to perceive the root 
cause of China's financial chaos and the imperative 
need of thorough reorganisation under reliable foreign 
supervision. 

If I thus insist upon the financial aspect of the situa- 
tion and the urgent need, before all else, of compulsory 
honesty in the public service, it is because of the tendency 
now prevalent in certain quarters to put the cart before 
the horse. No possible good can result from discussing 
the quarrel between the so-called Northern and Southern 
factions, the pooling of " spheres of influence," the 
unification of railway control, the reform of the currency, 
or any other question, so long as all the energies of the 
official class are centred in a struggle for possession of 
the public purse, to be refilled, whenever emptied, by 
reckless borrowing. It is obviously useless to attempt 
to protect the nation's sovereign rights so long as its 
Government is prepared to barter them for cash. 



84 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

Looking back over the history of China as it has 
developed during the last century, it seems impossible 
to deny that most of the nation's present disabilities and 
dangers are due to no fault of its own, but to the sudden 
creation by the Western Powers of a new condition of 
things to which the world's oldest civilisation was unable 
to adapt itself. Left to itself, that civilisation would 
undoubtedly have been sufficient to overcome such 
internal disorders as the Taiping Rebellion or the down- 
fall of the Manchu dynasty; but the economic pressure 
of modern Europe, its earth-hunger, cosmopolitan finance, 
and man-kilHng devices, forbade all hope of China's 
being permitted to maintain her ancient isolation. The 
material civihsation of the West asserted its superiority 
over that of the East by forcible means, with which all 
the wisdom of the East was unable to cope. If we 
admit this — as I think we must — ^then, if there be any- 
thing vital in the ideals which the Anglo-Saxon race 
professes, anything attainable in the League of Nations 
ideal of " a reign of law, sustained by the organised 
opinion of mankind," the West owes the East a deep 
debt of reparation. And it can only be discharged 
by sympathetic understanding of the Chinese people's 
real needs, and an earnest, self-denying determination to 
protect their helplessness through the necessary period 
of administrative reconstruction. 

And never has there been a race more worthily deserving 
of protection at the hands of humanity. For, say what 
you will, that very passive philosophy which exposes 
China to the rapacity of earth-hungry Powers, approaches 
more nearly to the essential principles of Christianity, as 
laid down in the Sermon on the Mount, than the every- 
day practice of most Christian nations. Here you have 
a people in very truth " too proud to fight," because 
they not only profess, but firmly beheve, that, in the 
long run, reason and justice must triumph over force. 
The poHshed pacifism of Confucius and the intellectual 
superiority of his offspring, the classical literati, both 



THE REPUBLIC OF TO-DAY 85 

tempered with the Buddhist doctrine of gentleness 
and compassion, have produced a type of civiHsation, 
a race-mind, fixed in unity of ideas, which to the 
Chinese themselves (and to many Europeans) seem 
morally superior to that of the West — a splendid 
inheritance. 

As a French writer ^ has recently expressed it, " The 
civilisation of China has stood its tests. It has provided 
countless generations of men with food, not only for the 
body, but the soul. It has been a school of moral beauty 
and virtue, of gentleness and wisdom. It has given to 
China a degree of happiness, and to the life of her people 
a stability and harmony, which have never been excelled 
(the Chinese would say never equalled) by any other 
civilisation." 

Given goodwill and a sincere desire on the part of the 
Powers to help the Chinese people to preserve this 
inheritance, there should be no insuperable difficulty in 
restoring law and order, peace and prosperity throughout 
the country. But the goodwill must be there, genuinely 
active, and based upon an earnest desire to co-operate 
in a common cause, upon principles of right and 
justice. 

^ Is this a counsel of perfection? I think not. At all 
events, the problem is simpler than many of those which 
the League of Nations proposes to solve in Europe — 
for instance, that of Poland. In the first place, it is 
obviously to the interest of the commercial Powers con- 
cerned, and especially of Japan, to put an end to the 
present chaotic state of affairs in China. It is equally 
evident that no one Power can hope to tackle the business 
single-handed. Intelligent self-interest points, therefore, 
on this occasion, in the same direction as that prescribed 
by philanthropy. There is still, no doubt, a very in- 
fluential body of opinion behind the MiUtary Party in 
Japan which holds to the ideal of fishing in troubled 
waters, but, for reasons which will be stated hereafter, 
* £mile Hovelaque, La Chine, 1920. 



86 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

I believe that even the Military Party is rapidly coming 
to the conclusion that a selfishly aggressive policy towards 
China is not likely to be profitable. Herein lies one of 
the most hopeful features of the situation. 

For observe, that while the dangers and difficulties 
which immediately threaten China are one and all the 
result of financial mal-administration, the actual wealth 
and resources of the country are such that an effective 
Central Government might easily become prosperously 
solvent within a comparatively short time, certainly 
within ten years. There is no reason whatever why 
the Chinese Government should remain impecunious, if 
only normal fiscal relations can be re-established between 
Peking and the provinces, and the country's debts tabu- 
lated and reorganised under expert and honest supervision. 
So long as the present senseless warfare of political 
factions continues, the Central Government's revenue- 
collecting energies must remain paralysed. The first 
thing needful is to place it in such a position of authority 
as shall enable it to gather into the national Treasury the 
land tax, salt dues, and other revenues which are at 
present collected and annexed by those predatory barons, 
the provincial Governors. For the last three years at 
least, Peking has been literally existing from hand to 
mouth, borrowing from Peter to pay Paul, and pawning 
the country's last realisable assets in the process. 

The financial situation with which we have now to 
deal in China is in some respects more encouraging than 
it was just before the outbreak of war in Europe. Apart 
from the fact that co-operation under an international 
reorganisation scheme would now seem to have become 
possible — which it never was before the war — ^the Chinese 
Government's revenues have been greatly increased for 
debt -paying purposes owing to the increase in the Customs 
duties and the rise in the value of silver.^ Then there is 
the probability that the Powers concerned may agree, as 

1 This was written before the price of silver collapsed, seriously 
increasing the dif&culties of China's national finances. 



THE REPUBLIC OF TO-DAY 87 

part of a reconstruction scheme, to reduce, or completely 
remit, China's obligations under the Boxer indemnities. 
Finally, there is the great and increasing national 
revenue produced by the reorganisation of the Salt 
Gabelle. But all the wealth of Golconda will never 
balance the Chinese budget — ^indeed, there can never be 
a budget to balance — until every dollar of income and 
expenditure is vouched for and audited by responsible 
expert accountants. The record of the Imperial Mari- 
time Customs, and that of the railways of North China, 
prove that a thoroughly effective system of auditing can 
be carried out without offending the susceptibilities of 
the Chinese authorities and with indisputable benefit to 
the national exchequer. On the other hand, the history 
of every railway, bank, or industrial enterprise under 
mandarin control has been financially disastrous, for all 
but the officials concerned. 

Under the scheme which originated at Washington in 
1918, steps have been taken to establish an International 
Board for the aboUtion of all railway spheres of influence 
and for merging all railway concessions into a national 
Chinese system, wherein the principle of effective financial 
control would be observed. The scheme, like the inten- 
tions of the financial Consortium, is excellent in itself, 
and, given a stable and solvent Government at Peking, 
it should be feasible, together with many other necessary 
reforms. But no good can possibly come of discussing 
any of these schemes until the problem of consolidating 
the Central Government has been successfully solved. If 
China is to escape disruption, if her people are to be 
enabled to pursue their normal ways of productive 
industry, the provincial Governors (Tuchuns) must cease 
from being each a law unto himself. This will only 
happen when their rabble armies have been disarmed 
and disbanded under such conditions as will ensure their 
final disappearance from the scene; that is to say, 
under the watchful, expert eyes of foreigners representing 
the Consortium, which must finance the disbandment 



88 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

operations. This at first may seem an impossible solu- 
tion, but, as a matter of fact, many competent observers, 
Chinese and European, consider that the scheme is 
practicable, and that the time has come to attempt 
its execution. In any case it offers the only alternative 
to anarchy. For, as matters stand, civil war in China 
has become a lucrative profession. 



CHAPTER V 

CIVIL WAR AS A PROFESSION 

Until the end of 1919, as the result of Young China's 
activities in the Press and of propaganda work done by 
one or two foreign journahsts in Chinese pay, a very 
general impression existed abroad that the southern pro- 
vinces and the North were seriously at war. Further- 
more, that the South was fighting for the Constitution 
and for the rightful powers of Parliament against the 
northern reactionaries or militarists ; and that the 
struggle would be waged to the bitter end, by fervent 
patriots, in the sacred name of liberty on the one side, 
and for the vindication of lawful authority on the other. 
Finally, that the South had established an independent 
Republican Government of its own at Canton, and that 
a conference of northern and southern delegates was 
engaged in discussing possible terms of peace in that 
safe and very hospitable neutral ground, the Foreign 
Settlement of Shanghai. 

From the utterances of the American and the British 
Press concerning this protracted but strangely silent 
struggle, it was evident that either its own preoccupa- 
tions or the vagueness of the news from China prevented 
the outside world from coming to any satisfactory con- 
clusion concerning either the merits of the combatants 
or the real cause of their strife. The picture of the 
South nobly struggling to be free, fighting against heavy 
odds for the liberties of the people, naturally aroused a 
good deal of sympathy at the outset; but the picture 
itself was so confused, and in some respects so obviously 
intended to beguile, that sympathy was generally tem- 

89 



90 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

pered with wait-and-see discretion. The emergence as 
Republican leaders of men like the ex-Minister Wu Ting- 
Fang, the ex- Viceroy Tsen, or ex-Governor Tang Shao-yi, 
was certainly sufficient to justify any amount of scepticism 
about the fervour of the southern Republic's radicalism ; 
for had not all of them contentedly held high office under 
the Manchus ? And then the swift series of events which 
followed upon President Yuan Shih-k'ai's attempt to 
seize the Throne, and his sudden death in June 1916; 
the Manchu Emperor's seven-day emergence, and the 
subsequent dismissals of Presidents and Premiers, amidst 
tumult and shouting of Tuchuns — all these things con- 
tributed to make impartial observers doubt that the 
Chinese world had been made safe for Republicanism. 

Since then, the picture of a war being waged in defence 
of political principles has faded gently into the limbo of 
things that are easily forgotten, and the world at large 
has gradually learned something of the real state of 
affairs. North and South, not to mention East and West, 
are still at war, in the sense that five super-Tuchuns 
and seventeen lesser satraps maintain armed forces in 
the field, and even more on paper. But these forces are 
not seriously engaged in any systematic warfare for the 
assertion of clearly-defined political principles. The only 
real warfare now waged is the same old struggle for place 
and patronage and pelf which has gone on, grim and 
silent, for centuries around and about the seats of the 
mighty in Peking. Moreover, there is no longer any 
serious pretence of vital difference between North and 
South. The Peace Conference at Shanghai continues to 
differ in perfect accord, partly because the delegates find 
in the Foreign Settlement a very pleasant and profitable 
gathering-place, but chiefly because both factions are 
agreed that the foreigner must somehow be impressed 
with the seriousness of the strife. Should he cease to 
provide further loans, either for the disbandment of 
troops or for administrative expenses, the bottom would 
fall out of a very safe and lucrative profession. 



CIVIL WAR AS A PROFESSION 91 

For this is what civil war has actually come to, in the 
supple hands of the modern mandarin. To show that 
the whole business is a stupendous farce, what better 
proof can be given than the fact that, in recent foreign 
loan negotiations, the Peking mihtarists have expressed 
their willingness to allow the " rebel " Cantonese to have 
a "slice of the melon," and that the financiers of the 
Consortium consent to do business, in the name of unity, 
with the house thus divided ? Where, outside of China, 
or Gilbert and Sullivan, would it be possible for alleged 
fierce belligerents to arrange a businesslike division of 
Customs revenues, so as not to disturb the security of 
the foreign bond-holder? Young China is in the habit 
of denouncing the governing chque at Peking and the 
provincial Tuchuns who support it as " militarists," 
and the Press abroad, which gets most of its ideas from 
and through Young China, has been misled by the misuse 
of this badly overworked word. Needless to say that 
in China there is no such thing as militarism, in the 
true sense of the term. The two-and-twenty Tuchuns 
who, with the aid of their uniformed ex-bandits and 
coohes, hold sway each in his own province, are the 
direct descendants, true to type, of the mandarin Viceroys 
and Governors of former days. 

When Young China denounces General this or Colonel 
that, and when the doings of these warriors are recorded 
in the native Press, the world at large naturally gets an 
impression of truculent fire-eaters, boot-and-saddle swash- 
bucklers of the picturesque Mexican type ; but the real 
article is something very different — generally a sleek 
Confucianist scholar up to date, a slim and subtle intelli- 
gence, coldly calculating and quite ruthless, who uses 
men and money with consummate ability. In the new 
game of pohtics which developed after the passing of 
the Dragon Throne, it was the super-men of the educated 
class who made their way to the top (never to the front), 
ambitious spirits and quick brains, that saw the tide 
of fortune and seized it when it served. And the real 



92 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

question in China to-day is, how to limit the power and 
rapacity of these Tuchuns, how to bring under the 
authority of the Central Government those who, during 
the past six years, have had time not only to taste 
the sweets of independent power, but to perfect, each 
in his own province, the machinery of self-determi- 
nation. Very self-determined fellows indeed are the 
Tuchuns. 

When Young China declares that it wishes to get rid of 
the mihtarists, what it really means is that it would like 
to oust from power the men who, relying on their hordes 
of bandits, have been able to amass wealth under the 
Republic far greater than any Viceroy ever amassed 
under the Empire, The object of the Cantonese " con- 
stitutionalists " in 1919-1920 was, in the first place, to 
get rid of the northern " militarists," that is to say, of 
General Tuan Chi-jui and his Anfu Club henchmen. 
This they claimed to do on high moral grounds, because 
Tuan's power had undoubtedly been upheld and his 
purse filled by Japanese money, at a serious risk to 
China's sovereignty in more than one direction. After 
that, they aspired to get rid of the northern Tuchuns 
and to replace them, in the public interest, by their own 
nominees. The only weak point about this programme, 
from the public point of view, lay in the notorious fact 
that the men who since 1916 had claimed to govern the 
southern RepubHc, have proved themselves just as greatly 
lacking in public spirit and administrative honesty as 
their colleagues of the North, and that, in the matter 
of " squeezing," there is nothing whatsoever to choose 
between a southern and a northern Tuchun. One of 
the most earnest intellectuals of foreign-educated Young 
China, Mr. S. G. Cheng, whom I had the pleasure of 
meeting at Peking in February 1920, deals very frankly 
with this aspect of the situation in his recently published 
work. Modern China. One passage is so illuminating, 
coming from a southerner, that it is worth quoting in 
full : 



CIVIL WAR AS A PROFESSION 93 

" For military operations against the North, the South 
depends on governors who are just as selfish as their 
northern colleagues. It also receives, as its allies, brigands 
or military leaders who have some personal grievance 
against the North and who desire to gratify their greed 
and ambition by taking advantage of the quarrel between 
the constitutionaHsts and the militarists. Among the 
army commanders of the South, many have no sympathy 
at all with the democratic aspirations of the constitu- 
tionalists, but fight their own battle under the cloak of 
a good cause. This hopeless state of affairs is acknow- 
ledged and deplored by the southern leader, Dr. Sun 
Yat-sen, who summarises the situation by saying that 
the struggle of military leaders for supremacy is equally 
rampant in the South and in the North, and that he has 
almost exhausted his voice, with no effect, in calling 
attention to the incoherent situation." 

A good deal of blood has flowed under the bridges 
since I ventured to suggest to Dr. Sun and his friends, 
in 1912, that nothing but anarchy could possibly result 
from their attempt to introduce ready-made republicanism 
in China. And much more blood will flow, unless the 
Powers intervene, before the inevitable Dictator emerges 
and compels the warring factions to cease from strife. 

As a good Confucianist, Mr. Cheng beUeves in appeaUng 
to the patriotism of the Tuchuns, in persuading them 
" to surrender their own interests, so as to save the 
country from further bloodshed." But to appeal to the 
patriotism of the Tuchuns would be " going to the goat's 
house for wool." It is reckoned by competent observers 
that every one of them (with two or three exceptions) 
has amassed a large fortune, and many are known to be 
multi-miUionaires. Some of them have invested vast 
sums in real estate at the Treaty Ports, whilst others 
have deposited their wealth in the foreign banks. Others, 
again, are looking about for safe investments in Anglo- 
Chinese companies, a fact which has a good deal to do 
with the recent development of the " co-operative enter- 
prise " idea. It has been estimated that, during the past 



94 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

eight years, the twenty-two Tuchuns and the metro- 
politan of&cials between them have squeezed enough 
money to pay off four-fifths of China's National Debt ; 
a good deal of this money has been " squeezed " from 
foreign loans and concession contracts. And all this 
time, while a handful of men have been growing fabulously 
rich, the Government, which they are supposed to serve, 
has been borrowing up to the very last limit of its 
credit. If there were any real patriotism amongst them, 
would they have continued to borrow abroad at ruinous 
rates of exchange? Would they not have lent to the 
State some of their own superfluous wealth? During 
the progress of the loan negotiations at Peking last year, 
it was common knowledge that many leading Chinese 
officials were ready and willing to subscribe a large 
amount of capital to the flotation of a chartered Anglo- 
Chinese company. But for internal national loans, to 
relieve the country's urgent needs, no money is forth- 
coming, for the simple reason that they are never repaid. 
And while millions of people are starving and selling 
their children in the famine districts, the Tuchuns do 
practically nothing to relieve their terrible burden of 
suffering. 

An appeal to their patriotism is evidently useless, 
where money is concerned, but the very wealth of the 
present group of Tuchuns might well be made instru- 
mental in relegating them and their rabble troops into 
private life, if they were once persuaded that the Powers 
were in earnest and that the provinces would have to 
reckon in future with a real, instead of a sham. Govern- 
ment at Peking. To the Western mind, the idea may 
sound fantastic; nevertheless, I heard many wise and 
experienced Chinese discuss the situation of their country 
at Peking and Shanghai last winter, and most of them 
were of opinion that the Tuchuns would be quite willing 
to have their troops disbanded for them by the obliging 
foreigner, so that they themselves might retire to dignified 
leisure in their well-feathered nests. As Tang Shao-yi 



CIVIL WAR AS A PROFESSION 95 

put it, when I discussed men and affairs at his private 
house in Shanghai, " I think they would hke to resign, 
so as to have time to attend to their investments. At 
all events," he said, " anything would be better than 
another revolution and a new lot of Tuchuns ; for the 
new lot would be in a great hurry to get rich, while the 
present lot ought to be nearly satisfied." (Tang Shao-yi, 
ex-Minister under the Manchus, ex-Special Envoy to the 
United States, scholar, diplomat, genial host, and good 
sportsman, seems to have developed a misanthropic vein 
since he forsook Yuan Shih-k'ai in 1912 and became a 
leader of the Cantonese secessionists. When I saw him 
he had retired, like Achilles, to his tent, and was taking 
no part in the Peace Conference, although still supposed 
to be chief spokesman for the .South. ) 

But to return to the Tuchuns, whose predatory habits 
and methods of " self-determination " constitute the 
immediate problem in China. The ease and impunity 
with which they have plundered, and are still plundering, 
the country, their cynical pretences of civil war, their 
endless plots and jealous intrigues, all have served to 
convince the large respectable majority of Chinese (who 
meddle not in politics) that a strong Central Government 
is the only possible corrective of chaos. The merchant 
class, in particular, fully realises that there is at present 
no Government in China, but only warring groups of self- 
seeking politicians, and that this fact alone accounts for 
the wickedness and the wealth of the Tuchuns. Under 
the Manchus, if the wealth of a Viceroy or a Governor 
was known to exceed the limits prescribed by dignity 
and decency, the offender was invited, with punctilious 
courtesy, to present himself for an audience at Peking, 
and there, with the utmost delicacy, a certain proportion 
of his wealth was taken from him and found its way 
back into circulation. Even the most powerful Viceroys 
could never resist these polite invitations, because loyalty 
to the Throne was a vital thing, a rallying-point and 
a restraining force throughout the entire mandarin 



96 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

hierarchy. That restraining force having disappeared, it 
was obviously a case of " to your tents, O Israel." The 
Tuchun of to-day has become a law unto himself, and 
there is none that can bring him to account. 

It is worth remembering that, as I have shown, had 
it not been for the intervention of Japan, Yuan Shih-k'ai 
would assuredly have restored the Throne in 1916, and 
with it the authority of the Central Government. After 
Yuan's death, the mantle of his power, which fell upon 
the shoulders of Tuan Ch'i-jui, was very ragged at the 
edges. Tuan's reason for forsaking his old chief and 
declining to support his claims to the Throne lay chiefly 
in the fact that he himself had designs on the Presidency 
of the Republic; therefore he denounced Yuan's policy 
as that of an autocrat and no true Republican. But no 
sooner had he become Prime Minister than he proceeded 
to follow Yuan's example, by appointing his own hench- 
men to vacancies in the provincial governorships and 
then proceeding to suppress all opposition by force. His 
policy, as defined by himself, lacked the terse vigour of 
Yuan's style, but it was quite definite enough to eliminate 
any earnest patriot's hopes of unity and concord. 

" I hope," he declared, " to unite and pacify the 
country by the aid of my northern colleagues. The 
policy of attacking the South and the South-west is only 
adopted because the Government in recent years has 
exhausted its wisdom and ability in meeting parliamentary 
tumults and has become sick of party compromise. 
Looking around the country, I find that only the real 
military force of the North can save the country and 
enforce the law." 

This was four years ago. Since then, Tuan has learned, 
even as Yuan learned before him, that, failing the 
authority of the Son of Heaven, only masterful autocracy, 
well provided with funds, can ever hope to secure the 
loyalty of ambitious provincial officials. In the previous 
chapter, the story of those five years was roughly 



CIVIL WAR AS A PROFESSION 97 

outlined; it is a tale so saturated with the treasons, 
stratagems, and spoils of rival politicians, that no single 
individual's record can be associated with any definite 
principle or policy. When, in the end, Tuan found 
himself between the devil of a hostile Parliament and 
the deep sea of chronic insolvency, his supporters, the 
Northern Governors, would only continue to back him 
at a price. That price had to be paid partly in cash, 
for the maintenance of their real and alleged forces, and 
partly by recognition of their fiscal and political inde- 
pendence. Under these circumstances, it soon became 
evident to Tuan and his friends in power at Peking that 
they must either face the prospect of an early retirement 
into private life or find some means of raising the money 
necessary to retain the " loyalty " of the Northern 
Governors. Herein, to put the matter frankly, lay the 
secret of the well-established ascendancy of Japan in the 
councils of Tuan Chi-jui and the so-called Northern Party. 
Up to the summer of 1920, it was all a question of 
funds. Tuan and the Anfu Club have since been over- 
thrown by a rival political faction, but the President and 
the Chihli party are now denounced by the South, on 
the very same grounds and with equal fervour. History 
repeats itself, in this matter, with monotonous regularity. 
Just as in 1900 Li Hung-chang sold a portion of his 
country's birthright for a savoury mess of Russian 
pottage, so Tuan Chi-jui, the Anfu Club, and its packed 
Parhament, maintained themselves in power with funds 
borrowed from Japan, at a price which will be found 
to be no light one when the accounts fall due for pay- 
ment. And Tuan having fallen (with a full purse and 
no penalties), the two great satraps of the North, Chang 
Tso-lin and Tsao Kun, are now openly accused of being 
in Japanese pay. 

And so, after eight years of that Repubhc which was 
to demonstrate the patriotism of the classes and the 
self-governing capacity of the masses, China has reached 
a condition of affairs which causes most of her people 

H 



98 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

to sigh for the comparatively honest days of the old 
Empress Dowager. Neither of the so-called Governments 
of the North and the South makes any pretence of trying 
to govern ; both are nothing more than groups of officials, 
each struggling at all costs to feather its own nest, before 
the bankruptcy of the country shall compel the inevitable 
intervention of the foreign Powers. Education, which 
was to have been the Republic's first care, is either 
completely neglected or left to the initiative of public- 
spirited scholars and local gentry. With the exception 
of the Customs, Post-office, and Salt revenues, collected 
under the supervision of foreigners, which form the 
security for China's foreign debts, the Central Govern- 
ment's revenues from the provinces are small and pre- 
carious. With regard to such internal matters as the 
administration of justice, the regulation of trade, opium- 
growing, and military equipment, each province goes 
its independent way, either asserting complete rights of 
autonomy or maintaining poUte relations with the capital, 
as each Governor may think fit. The Northern provinces, 
whose Governors have usually supported the nominal 
authority of Peking, in return for subsidies in cash, have 
been occasionally and to some extent united against the 
southern Tuchuns, and may generally be relied upon 
to join forces to prevent the Cantonese (or any other) 
clique from ousting and replacing their own friends and 
nominees. But neither in the North nor in the South 
has there been at any time anything approaching to real 
cohesion in the ranks of the forces supposed to be at 
civil war. The only constant and conspicuous feature 
of the situation on both sides has lain in the incessant 
intrigues of one Tuchun against another. There is no 
solidarity in any group or party ; secret emissaries from 
northern Tuchuns are constantly being sent on more 
or less treasonable missions to leaders in the south, and 
vice-versa. Men who should be working together are 
known to be secretly plotting against each other; it is 
a case of every man for himself, and the devil take the 
hindermost. 



CIVIL WAR AS A PROFESSION 99 

During my stay in Shanghai, in January 1920, I spent 
several days in endeavouring to ascertain from the 
alleged leaders of the Northern and Southern delegates 
to the Peace Conference what real differences prevented 
them from uniting in a patriotic endeavour to rescue 
their country from its present deplorable condition. 
The results of this inquiry were purely negative; of a 
nature, in fact, to confirm one's conviction that none of 
these word-warriors wanted peace, for the simple reason 
that they all stood to profit individually by the con- 
tinuance of strife, much in the same way that a con- 
siderable number of offtcials have always waxed fat on 
the devastating floods of the Yellow River and the 
distribution of famine relief. 

First, I saw the Cantonese leader, Tang Shao-yi, whom 
in the old Manchu days I had known as Governor of 
Fengtien, and later as Director-General of Railways at 
Peking. But, as I have said. Tang had but then just 
withdrawn, in dudgeon, from the Conference, because of 
some personal objection to the leading Northern delegate, 
Wang I-Tang, and at the moment the Canton province 
was therefore unrepresented : in other words, the Con- 
ference was, officially speaking, at a standstill. Tang 
decHned to discuss the idea of a Coahtion Government 
representing both North and South, although he admitted 
that the leaders of the opposing factions had all con- 
trived to work together, amicably enough, under the 
Manchus. But he waxed very eloquent in denouncing 
Tuan Chi-jui and the Northerners, who, he declared, were 
basely selling the country to the Japanese. Asked for 
a clear definition of the political principles at issue, he 
frankly confessed that it was no longer a question of 
differences between North and South, but the so-called 
Radicals were fighting for a principle when they denied 
the right of the President, under compulsion of the 
Tuchuns, to dissolve Parhament. 

" If Peking were to recognise this principle," I inquired, 
" would the Cantonese party come to terms ? " 

" It is too late for that," he replied, " but, as a matter 



100 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

of fact, there is no real fighting at present. On the 
other hand, there will be no real peace until the people 
in power at Peking put an end to the Military Agreement 
with Japan, and to all the other secret agreements of 
the last five years. Every one of the ' eight demands ' 
which the Southern delegates have put forward, and 
which Peking decUnes to discuss, arises, directly or 
indirectly, from the fact that the Government at Peking 
has become nothing more nor less than a dependency 
of Tokyo. Even the Shantung question is of trifling 
importance as compared to this fact." 

There is no doubt that at this time the South — or, to 
describe more accurately the opponents of the Peking 
Government, the " Outs " — ^had a good rallying cry and 
a powerful appeal to all patriotic sentiments in the 
country when they demanded " the abolition of the 
Military Agreement with Japan, and of the War Partici- 
pation Loan, together with the punishment of the Chinese 
who signed them." The significance of this secret treaty 
will be discussed in due course, when we come to con- 
sider the whole question of Japanese policy in China. 
But, looking at the matter from the Cantonese malcon- 
tents' point of view, there is no denying the force of the 
argument on which they based their demand for full 
publication of all the agreements that have been made 
from 1917 to 1920 between the Anfu Club clique at 
Peking and the Japanese Government or its agents. 
With regard to the Mihtary Agreement in particular, 
they asserted that, instead of being, as it was announced, 
a convention intended to protect China's rights and 
sovereignty in her northern dependencies, threatened by 
the disorder in Siberia, it was, in fact, a surrender of 
Chinese sovereignty to Japanese agents, in return for 
money, equipment, and military advisers, all of which 
Tuan and his friends used solely to strengthen their own 
position against their political opponents. Tang Shao-yi 
emphasised the fact that, when the agreement was made 
in 1918, it was declared to be for common action by 



CIVIL WAR AS A PROFESSION 101 

China and Japan and for purposes of mutual defence 
against German and Bolshevik attack, and especially for 
the protection of the Eastern-Siberian railway. Further- 
more, that it was to terminate automatically at the same 
time as Allied intervention in Siberia. On the face of 
it, when the Allies withdrew, the agreement should have 
lapsed. The full details of the agreement itself have 
never been disclosed, but Tang Shao-yi and his friends 
claimed to know that letters were exchanged at Peking 
on the loth of February and the ist of March, 1919, by 
virtue of which the agreement remains in force for an 
indefinite period. They declared that its conditions not 
only conferred upon Japan a rapidly-extending control 
over China's military forces in the North, but that they 
virtually reasserted all the " protectorate " conditions 
imposed by the famous " fifth group " of the twenty-one 
demands of May 1915. They pointed to the number and 
feverish activity of the Japanese military officers already 
attached to the Peking and Manchurian divisions, and 
professed to believe that, as part of the secret pact, 
Japan was regularly " contributing " 2,000,000 yen a 
month towards the reorganisation of China's Army — in 
other words, towards the replenishment of its leaders' 
purses . 

Many of these details were possibly nothing more than 
intelligent surmise, and incapable of proof, but it remains 
unpleasantly true that when the " Outs " thus denounce 
the " Ins " for high treason, their accusations must 
remain irrefutable, so long as the party in power at 
Peking continues to depend on Japanese loans and 
subsidies for its very existence. If the Opposition, dis- 
carding aU side issues, had ever been able to unite in 
one genuine effort of patriotism and to attack the ruling 
chque at Peking on this question alone, they would 
undoubtedly have commanded a wide measure of sym- 
pathy and support, not only in China, but from those 
Liberal elements in Japan which have frankly denounced 
the Military Agreement as an act of bad faith and bad 



102 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

policy. But nothing of this Idnd is to be expected from 
either of the present Parhaments or from any influential 
body of pubhc opinion in China. 

The proceedings of the Peace Conference at Shanghai 
made it abundantly clear that the " Outs " are not very 
much in earnest about anything, except getting in, or, 
failing that, getting a share of whatever loans and subsidies 
may be going. 

There were ten Northern delegates at Shanghai in 
January 1920, who collectively might well have been 
described as " Joy-riders to the sea " ; for at that time 
they had already spent five months very contentedly, on 
full pay, awaiting the pleasure of the South to renew 
the pleasant game of logomachy in the comfortable 
premises which were once the German club. To judge 
by all reports, Wang I-Tang, their chief delegate, had 
more trouble in dealing with his own followers than with 
the opposition; for each of these Northern delegates 
represented first an individual Tuchun, or party chief- 
tain, and the North only as a bad second. One individual 
stood for the interests of Chang Tso-lin, the autocrat of 
Moukden; another represented Tsao Kun, the Tuchun 
of Chihli; a third held his brief for Little Hsii, warden 
of the Mongolian borders, and so on. Each and every 
one of these men was notoriously ready to intrigue with 
friend or foe, if by so doing he could increase his own 
patron's power and prestige at the expense of rival 
chieftains. If the Peace Conference has achieved nothing 
else, it has proved conclusively that there is neither solid 
North nor solid South, nothing, in fact, but a number of 
kaleidoscopic factions, each fighting for its own sordid 
ends. 

I saw Wang I-Tang in a house of many mansions, 
surrounded by beautiful gardens, on the Bubbling Well 
road at Shanghai. Under the Manchus, Wang would 
probably have been a typical Taotai of the old classical 
model, full of pomp and ceremony and polite platitudes. 
As a modern Republican mandarin, he gave me the 



CIVIL WAR AS A PROFESSION 103 

impression of an Oriental Count Fosco with bluntly 
democratic manners and the surface geniality of a faux 
bonhomme ; but he had the coldly vigilant eye of a 
tortoise, beady and unblinking. The man whom the 
Anfu Club had selected to represent them could be no 
novice at the political game ; but Wang's affable manner 
was intended to suggest the philosophical detachment of 
an orthodox mandarin. When, after discussing the situa- 
tion and its perils, I inquired whether nothing could be 
done to secure unity of councils for the good of the 
State, he thought that it might be quite possible, in 
time. But for the moment, inasmuch as Kuangtung 
was unrepresented, he feared that the Conference could 
make no progress; at any rate he was not prepared to 
discuss the South's " eight demands." He thought that 
in two or three months Tang Shao-yi might perhaps be 
persuaded to "come out" again with new proposals; 
meanwhile we must have patience. To arrange every- 
thing satisfactorily would take a long time, probably 
five or ten years. He cordially agreed that Peking 
could not possibly carry on much longer without obtain- 
ing its regular revenues from the provinces, but no doubt 
the foreign Powers would continue to advance the neces- 
sary funds for some time to come. He declared that 
the payment of troops was becoming a matter of urgent 
and serious difficulty. Disbandment ? That would mean 
bonuses and payment of arrears and the provision of 
employment for about 1,500,000 men, and even if the 
money were obtainable by loan, it would be very difficult 
to bring all the Tuchuns to one mind on the subject. 
When I suggested that a strong expression of public 
opinion, proclaimed through the delegates, might induce 
the Tuchuns to devote some of their own large savings 
to paying off their troops, he smiled what the Chinese 
call a " cold smile " and quickly changed the conversa- 
tion. Was it true, he asked, that since the war America 
had become so rich, and England so poor, that the 
world's loan market will be in New York for the future ? 



104 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

I began to understand why the Southern delegates object 
to Wang I-Tang on personal grounds. 

A fortnight later, at Moukden, in Manchuria, I saw the 
great super-Tuchun, Chang Tso-lin, whose administrative 
ability, bold initiative, and shrewd business instincts had 
already spread the fame of his name all over China. 
Even before his emergence in the crisis of last summer, 
Chang held the three Manchurian provinces in the 
hollow of his hand; every Chinese official therein was 
his most obedient servant and rejoiced to do his bidding. 
Down south they will tell you that in bygone days Chang 
was a " hung hu tzu," that is to say, a bandit, and 
from the tales men tell of his Draconian methods and 
feverish activities, you imagine to yourself, before you 
meet him, a swashbuckler in a cocked hat surrounded 
by fierce retainers. As a matter of fact, like all the 
other Tuchuns, Chang does wear a cocked hat on 
occasions, to comply with the Republic's curious new 
ideas of dress and deportment; but when he receives 
the passing guest without ceremony, in his sumptuously 
furnished apartment of the Moukden yamen, the impres- 
sion he gives you is that of a scholar, even a dilettante, 
with his slender figure, in its sober-coloured silk riding- 
jacket, and his careful speech, which i'^ that of the literary 
elegant. Like most of the prese..t-day governors of 
China, Chang is a young man for such a post, being 
now in his forty-eighth year; but as you talk with him, 
you get an inkling of the qualities that account for 
his extraordinarily rapid rise to power, the energy and 
courage of the man, the amazing swiftness and clearness 
of his brain. You realise that the qualities that bring 
a leader to the front in China, the things which appeal 
to the instinctive respect of the masses, are the same 
yesterday, to-day, and to-morrow, and that the chief 
secret of Chang's power is that (like the Empress Dowager, 
or Li Hung-chang) his methods conform instinctively to 
the workings of the Chinese race-mind. No one can call 
him over-scrupulous, but he knows to a nicety how far 



CIVIL WAR AS A PROFESSION 105 

to go without undue risk in any direction; and in the 
matter of official trading, his countrymen — no bad judges 
— ^regard him as a positive genius. 

As we talked of Japanese encroachments on China's 
sovereign rights, of the growing of opium, of the dis- 
bandment of troops, and other delicate topics, I under- 
stood why it is that the name of Chang Tso-lin inspired 
respect even unto the Peace Conference at Shanghai, and 
why his armed forces are on a different footing to those 
of most provincial satraps. At the end of January he 
had replied to the Presidential Mandate, which broached 
the question of a general disbandment, that no reduction 
of his troops was possible; on the contrary, that his 
forces would have to be increased, for the protection of 
the Chinese eastern railway and the Mongolian frontier. 
Many Chinese predict that when the bulk of the Southern 
Tuchuns' forces are disbanded — as they must be, sooner 
or later — Chang will be in a position to dictate his own 
terms to Peking, and that his will be the deciding hand 
in settling most of the political questions of the immediate 
future. 

In the meanwhile, however, even a brief study of his 
masterful methods in Manchuria is sufficient to throw 
a good deal of light on the way the Tuchuns have 
amassed their fortunes. Chang combines the financial 
acumen of a Morgan with the business instincts of a 
Selfridge, and he leaves nothing to chance. He owns 
his own bank, his own farms, and with a finger in every 
commercial pie, makes his undisputed authority felt, like 
a live wire, throughout the three provinces. As banker 
and Tuchun combined, his method of dealing with the 
problems of local finance appears to be simple but drastic. 
When, in 1919, certain banks at Moukden engaged in a 
combine for manipulating exchange in a manner more 
profitable to themselves than to outsiders, it is reported 
that he called a meeting of all concerned and, speaking 
as Military Governor, genially intimated that any further 
attempt to corner exchange would involve the summary 



106 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

execution of the offenders, Tuchun bank stock has been 
a good market ever since. The bean trade, the rice trade, 
the money market, the operations of railway transport 
companies, one and all recognise and obey his supple 
master-hand, and minister to the wants of its Treasury. 
His emissaries are many and active, not only in Manchuria, 
but at Peking and even as far as the Yangtsze provinces ; 
if report speaks truly, they take an active part in the 
speculative but very profitable opium traffic. When I 
spoke of this matter, Chang was sure, oh, quite sure, 
that no opium was grown anywhere within the limits 
of his jurisdiction; nevertheless, only that week the 
Anti-Opium Association at Peking had published a state- 
ment that the poppy was being freely cultivated in the 
Moukden district. And I myself can bear witness to the 
fact that a brisk trade in the drug was being carried on, 
in and through the city itself, by smugglers (chiefly 
Russian women), who bring it by the railway from 
Vladivostock and Harbin, and thence to Shanghai and 
beyond. 

In Manchuria proper there are few, if any, bandits 
to-day. Chang's soldiers are regularly paid, and he 
himself organises their food supply. Law and order are 
maintained within the three provinces, and productive 
industry encouraged. Here, then, before our eyes, we 
have an object lesson which emphasises the simple fact 
that only a strong hand of effective authority is required 
to make China peaceful and prosperous. The same 
obvious truth has been demonstrated by Yen, Tuchun 
of Shansi, a wise and honest ruler. But, as matters 
stand, China as a whole is hopelessly misruled by the 
great majority of the twenty-two Tuchuns who have 
attained to arbitrary power in the provinces; the ruling 
clique at Peking are still in bondage to foreign pay- 
masters ; Parliament is utterly discredited, and education 
at a standstill. Only here and there, in a few of the 
Provincial Assemblies or amongst the educated local 
gentry, does one find a glimmer of patriotic and con- 



CIVIL WAR AS A PROFESSION 107 

structive energy. The present self-elected rulers of China 
are utterly incapable of restoring order, and if the 
country is to have ten or fifteen years of peace, which 
it needs, foreign intervention will have to establish it. 

The events of the past year, the recent clash of armed 
forces struggling for the mastery at Peking, and the 
present position of political affairs throughout China, 
afford conclusive proof — if proof be still needed — of the 
futility of hoping for the evolution of any well-ordered 
system of stable self-government from the existing chaos. 
Only a benevolent despotism can restore peace and 
prosperity, and unfortunately there is at the moment no 
super-mandarin in sight, " no man of mark," as Sir 
Robert Hart put it, " whom all China would accept." 
It would therefore seem that chaos must continue, with 
all its burden of unnecessary suffering for the wretched 
people, until, by process of exhaustion, the elements of 
strife shall disappear. Meanwhile, let us examine briefly 
the actual condition of affairs and ask ourselves dis- 
passionately in what respect, and to what extent, has 
the welfare of the Chinese people been advanced by the 
revolution of 1911 and its consequences ? 

Last July, when various poHtical groups united in wrath 
against the Anfu Club, and when, by force of arms, Tuan 
Chi-jui, Little Hsii, and other leaders of the so-called 
" Militarist " faction had been driven from power, it 
was hoped that the victorious General, Wu Pei-fu, with 
Chang Tso-lin to support him, would be able to carry 
through his plan of convening a Citizens' Convention, 
and thus put an end to the strife of rival Parliaments. 
Hopes were forcibly expressed by Young China's organs 
at Shanghai and in the South that the downfall of Tuan's 
party meant the end of Japanese ascendancy and a 
prospect of popular government in a united country. 
But what are the actual results of the struggle? No 
sooner had the Chihli party, headed by the President 
and the Tuchuns Chang Tso-lin and Tsao Kun, defeated 
their opponents, than new symptoms of strife became 



108 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

manifest in the camp of the victors. Some of them 
(notably the President) began to display unmistakable 
signs of sympathy for the defeated Anfu leaders who 
had sought refuge and protection as guests of the Japanese 
Minister. Tuan Chi-jui, allowed to retire, with the honours 
and profits of war, is living as a prosperous citizen in 
close proximity to the Presidential mansion. Little 
Hsii, for whose arrest a large reward was originally 
offered, has been allowed to escape from the Japanese 
Legation and is believed to have returned to his former 
stamping-grounds in Mongolia. The " two traitors," 
Tsao Ju-lin and Lu Tsung-ju, removed from office in 
disgrace as the result of the students' violent agitation 
two years ago because of their financial dealings with 
Japan, are now the President's honoured guests and 
confidential advisers. General Wu Pei-fu has been rele- 
gated to the background by common consent of the 
scheming politicians, and with him the National Con- 
vention idea has been quietly shelved. It is the declared 
intention of the Government, or rather of the chieftains 
who for the moment control the situation, to convoke 
a new Parliament so soon as an agreement concerning 
the spoils of war can be concluded with Lu Yung-ting, 
who commands what is left of public opinion and military 
forces in Kuangtung. It is evidently to the interest of 
all the warring factions at Peking to come to terms with 
Canton, and, as before, to present the appearance of 
agreeing to differ in peace, because all are equally anxious 
to borrow money from the Consortium, and it would 
seem natural to expect that all loans from that quarter 
must cease so long as the nation is at war with itself. 
But even if such an agreement were concluded, it might 
produce a loan, but it could not bring either peace or 
a Parliament to Peking. Leaving the South out of the 
question, the leaders of the Chihli faction are evidently 
incapable of sinking their individual ambitions and 
greed in any common purpose of patriotism. Hardly 
had they made an end of congratulations and rejoicings 



CIVIL WAR AS A PROFESSION 109 

over the defeat of the Anfu faction, than Chang Tso-Hn 
and Tsao Kun began insisting on their respective claims 
to any money that might be forthcoming, for payment 
of the expenses of their week's campaign (the com- 
bined total of these claims, as stated by the native 
Press, amounting to some $40,000,000). At the same 
time, they began to compete with each other to secure 
the disbanded troops of the two Frontier Defence Corps, 
while the President, on his side, proceeded to strengthen 
his own hand by recruiting two new brigades of troops 
through his representative, Wang Huai-ching. So, while 
the shadow of famine spread darkly over the Northern 
provinces, these leaders of the people continued to 
squander the public substance and to sow new seeds of 
civil strife. The net result of the latest political upheaval 
has been to diminish the power of some of the smaller 
Tuchuns, and to increase that of the great political 
chieftains, so that at the beginning of October there were 
five clearly-marked spheres of influence in China, each 
ruled by its own satrap, and each more or less hostile 
to all the others. Both the President and Chang Tso-lin 
are now openly denounced as being more completely 
subject to Japanese influence than the Anfu Club itself, 
and the youthful patriots of the Treaty Ports are begin- 
ning to declare that the new era cannot dawn until 
President Hsii has disappeared from public life. And 
so, da capo. The fact that no body of politicians at 
Peking carries any weight whatsoever outside the metro- 
polis, is gradually producing a vague movement in favour 
of provincial autonomy and the creation of a Central 
Government entrusted only with international and inter- 
provincial relations; but its advocates can offer no con- 
vincing arguments to justify the hope that such a solution 
would put an end to inter-provincial strife. On the 
other hand, the restoration of General Chang Hsiin and 
other avowed monarchists to place and power, under the 
immediate patronage of the President and Chang Tso-lin, 
leads many observers to the belief that a restoration of 



110 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

the Throne is not only probable, but that, because it 
would create a rallying-point for disinterested loyalty, 
it offers the best, if not the only, hope of restoring some- 
thing like normal conditions and tranquillity throughout 
the land. 

The matrimonial alliance concluded in September 
between the families of Chang Tso-lin and Tsao Kun, 
and the rapprochement of these two powerful Tuchuns 
with Tuan Chi-jui and his followers, point to a new 
combination and consolidation of power in the hands of 
these mandarins, who will undoubtedly exercise that 
power in accordance with the traditions of their class. 
In their hands. Cabinets, Presidents, Parliaments, the 
Republic itself, become empty names, toys for the 
delectation of innocents abroad. And it may safely be 
predicted that under their administration the ascendancy 
of Japanese influence at Peking will be increased, rather 
than diminished, and that the patriots and malcontents 
of Young China will therefore be in a position to denounce 
the Northern militarists more vehemently than ever, and 
new combinations of military forces will be formed in 
the Central and Southern provinces to " punish the 
traitors." 

Amidst all the tangled web of frauds and futility 
produced by the word-spinners who live on and around 
the warring Tuchuns, one instructive and somewhat 
pathetic figure emerges, that of the Kiangsu Tuchun, 
Li Shun, who committed suicide on October 12, leaving 
a quarter of his fortune (estimated at $10,000,000) to 
famine relief and another quarter to educational work. 
Li Shun and his career recall to mind, in some ways, 
the orthodox type of Confucianist scholar-mandarin; 
and his death, offered up in a valedictory message as 
a plea for national unity, struck the kind of note which 
always makes a powerful appeal to the mind of the 
masses. But the pathos of his death lies in the utter 
futility of a self-sacrifice that had no Atdl principle 
behind it. General Li Shun, as a Tuchun, was no 



CIVIL WAR AS A PROFESSION 111 

better and no worse than most of his contemporaries. 
As leader of the League of Tuchuns which set out to 
destroy the power of Tuan Chi-jui, and subsequently as 
chief Northern delegate at the Peace Conference, he 
displayed in his public utterances a genuine desire to 
put an end to the strife of the warring parties. In a 
manifesto which he issued last June, he called on all 
good citizens to unite against the Anfu Club; at the 
same time, he begged the latter to abandon its evil ways, 
to cease from selling the country to foreign capitalists, 
and unite for the preservation of China. He was a 
professed progressive, a friend of the student movement, 
and an advocate of the National Convention; neverthe- 
less, when the Anfu party had been overthrown and all 
the Liberal elements in the country were calling for an 
immediate disbandment of troops, he behaved just like 
any other Tuchun, that is to say, he cordially supported 
the movement, while increasing his own forces by five 
brigades. In other words, like most of his colleagues, 
he was a theoretical reformer and a practical reactionary. 
His suicide was generally attributed to the combined 
effects of illness and of chagrin at having been deprived 
of a certain amount of "face" by Chang Tso-lin; but 
his valedictory words, in the classical manner, imputed 
no blame, either to friend or foe. " In vain," he declared, 
" have I worked for the unification of my beloved country ; 
" I can see no sign of any agreement. It is my dying 
" wish that all my fellow-citizens, men and women alike, 
" should cease from striving after wealth and rank, and 
" do everything in their power to save China from destruc- 
" tion. If each were willing to sacrifice something for his 
" country, then might I smile in Hades." For which 
parting words, according to Chinese ideas, much will be 
forgiven Li Shun. He had found in civil war a profes- 
sion which brought him no small share of wealth and 
power. Originally a captain in the service of the Viceroy 
Yuan Shih-k'ai, he had thrown in his lot with the 
revolutionaries in 1911, and on that flood of ci^'' 



112 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

war been borne on to fortune. But in the end he 
made restitution, and for the rest, it could never be said 
of him that he had traffic with the aHen money- 
lender, or sold any of his country's birthright to the 
foreigner. 



CHAPTER VI 

CHINA : THE PROBLEM OF RECONSTRUCTION 

Any vSuggestions for the reorganisation of China's 
finances and the reconstruction of the Central Govern- 
ment upon a new basis of effective authority must 
proceed on the assumption that the commercial Powers 
chiefly concerned in the solution of the problem — America, 
England, and Japan — are sincerely desirous of solving 
it and are prepared to co-operate to that end. In 
particular, it must be assumed that, given a clear indication 
of policy, the growing strength of genuine Liberalism in 
Japan will be able to bring sufficient weight of public 
opinion to bear upon the Jingo element of the Military 
Party to induce it to desist from further encroachments 
upon China's territory and sovereign rights. It may be 
objected that these assumptions admit of wide discussion. 
No doubt they do; nevertheless, they are not more 
Utopian than those upon which the civilised world 
proposes to reconstruct Central Europe, and they are 
much less involved. The question of Japanese policy 
in China will be discussed in a later chapter; for the 
moment, I would merely observe that neither the utter- 
ances of public men in Japan nor the general tendency 
of public opinion in that country precludes the hope of 
a practical agreement, by means of which the reconstruc- 
tion of China may be undertaken in a liberal spirit of 
co-operation, and the attitude recently displayed by the 
Japanese Government towards the Consortium justifies 
this hope. Speaking from personal observation, I am 
convinced that the intellectual and progressive movement 
in Japan — especially conspicuous in the younger genera- 
I 113 



114 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

tion — is genuinely in favour of a policy towards China 
which shall cultivate her friendship and preserve her 
independence and self-respect, whilst assisting in the 
development of her latent resources. But if the forces 
of conservatism and military Imperialism should still 
prove to be too strong; if Japan, when faced with the 
necessity of coming to a definite decision, should decline 
to co-operate in an international scheme for the reorganisa- 
tion of China, there can be no immediate prospect of any 
peaceful solution of the problem. In that case, matters 
must continue to drift, and the helpless Chinese people 
to suffer all the penalties of chaotic misrule until the 
country's disorders precipitate a new crisis and make it 
once again a cockpit and centre of international strife. 

The Western world has had enough on its hands for 
the past six years without troubling itself about China, 
so that, generally speaking, it knows little or nothing 
about the course of events in the Far East during this 
period. It is generally understood that Japan has taken 
advantage of the opportunities which the war gave her 
to develop her economic and political position in China 
by measures which have been severely criticised; that 
the Peking Government is hopelessly insolvent; and 
that Young China's political activities — as indicated by 
the student movement and the anti- Japanese boycott — ■ 
have become a conspicuous feature of the situation. 
But, because the masses of the Chinese people are un- 
represented by platform or Press, and themselves wholly 
inarticulate, the central fact of the situation is commonly 
ignored. That fact is, that the present condition of the 
country, its internecine strife, fiscal disorganisation, and 
administrative chaos, with all the burden of suffering 
which these conditions inflict upon the peasantry and 
traders, are no new thing. Chaos and confusion arose 
with the disappearance of the authority of the Manchu 
dynasty, and have continued ever since, gradually under- 
mining the ancient fabric of established law and order, 
to the point that every province is now a law unto itself. 



PROBLEM OF RECONSTRUCTION 115 

This fact must be emphasised, if only to remind those 
who may have forgotten it, that the problem with which 
the world has to deal in China, is not due to any recent 
or transient causes, nor can it be ever solved by temporary 
or partial measures. There is a tendency very prevalent 
amongst the supporters of Young China's political 
aspirations, and advocates of " self-determination," to 
ignore this all-important fact. It is a tendency which 
has already done a great deal of harm, and is likely to do 
much more. 

Long ago, Prince Ito, wisest of Oriental statesmen, 
uttered words of warning, addressed to those who 
believed in the capacity of Young China to organise 
and lead a truly national movement : 

" Within the last few years," he said, " there has been, 
no doubt, a considerable and very rapid change, but even 
that change is not so much a spontaneous growth from 
within, as the result of the importation of Western ideas 
from without by Young Chinese who have been educated 
abroad and who have returned to their own country not 
only imbued with Western conceptions, but so greatly 
estranged from all the old Chinese conceptions that they 
almost as much lost contact with the Chinese point of 
view as if they themselves were foreigners by birth. 
Hence the crudity and violence of the doctrines which 
they teach. . . . The young students form a very vocal 
and not unimportant body of agitators, many of whom 
are animated by excellent intentions, but they have 
hardly any roots in the country, and they can hardly be 
said to form a class capable of directing any practical 
course of action." 

Prince Ito's words were written eleven years ago, that 
is to say, two years before the Chinese revolution. Since 
then Young China's " crudity and violence " have rather 
increased than diminished, but of any practical course 
of action it has given no sign. A number of the agitators 
to whom Prince Ito then referred have since attained 
to high official posts under the Republic. Some have 



116 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

become Members of Parliament, others members of the 
Government, and some have even become Tuchuns 
(provincial Military Governors). They have had their 
full share of opportunity in the Metropolitan Ministries, 
in the provincial yamens, and in the missions and com- 
missions of the diplomatic and Consular services; but 
in none of these, as a class, have they made good. In 
their lack of integrity, disinterested patriotism, and 
constructive efficiency, they have remained, almost 
without exception, typical mandarins, whilst they have 
frequently lacked the sense of dignity which, with all its 
faults, the mandarinate displayed under the old regime. 
But Young China still continues to proclaim all the old 
illusory visions of a Promised Land of peace and plenty, 
to be attained by the magic of a paper Constitution, all 
the old familiar programme of a New Era, to be achieved 
by replacing the " Ins " by the " Outs." Indeed, in the 
matter of professions and aspirations, the polished 
periods of Mr, C. T. Wang and Mr. Wellington Koo bear 
so striking a family likeness to the rhetoric of Mr. Sun 
Yat-sen, that one cannot help wondering whether the 
student of to-day has ever read the high-sounding 
manifestoes of the founder of the Republic. 

Whatever may have been the hopes and dreams of 
ten years ago, the Chinese themselves, the merchants, 
gentry, and solid elements in the country, have certainly 
ceased to believe in the vision of the Promised Land. 
On the contrary, they are frankly weary of the fruitless 
clamour of the politicians and the shameless rapacity 
of the new bureaucracy. They are all convinced that 
what China needs above all else, is ten years of uninter- 
rupted peace, of law and order. Given such a breathing 
space, together with the development of the country's 
natural resources, there is nothing to prevent her from 
becoming one of the most productive and prosperous 
nations on earth. But this peace she cannot possibly 
achieve under her present rulers, unless forcibly assisted 
from without; of that there is no longer any doubt. 




" SHE DWELT AMONG THE UNTRODDEN WAYS." 




B. T. Prideau.x] 



HOMEWARD AT EVENING. 



PROBLEM OF RECONSTRUCTION 117 

If therefore the Powers desire to see China's ancient 
civihsation preserved, if they desire to develop a great 
centre of trade and to remove a grave source of danger 
in the Far East, that assistance must be forthcoming, 
and without delay. 

As to the manner in which this assistance should be 
rendered and the objects towards which it should be 
directed, differences of opinion will necessarily arise, 
and the conflicting interests of the Powers concerned 
will, no doubt, find their reflection in the working out 
of any practical scheme for co-operative action. But 
disinterested opinion, including that of the most in- 
fluential Chinese, is united at the outset in one con- 
clusion, namely, that the first step which the Powers 
must take is to insist upon the disbandment of the 
provincial Tuchuns' so-called armies. If China is to 
escape disruption, this step has become imperatively 
necessary. Many leading Chinese officials would be 
prepared to advocate it openly, though now they dare 
not, if they were once convinced that the friendly Powers 
would see the thing through. They are quite clear in 
their minds that if China is to survive, not only her 
Government, but her Army must be centralised. And 
the Army, when centralised, should not exceed 250,000 
men, enough to provide, say, a brigade for each province, 
with a mobile force of four or five picked divisions at 
Peking to be available for the suppression of disorder at 
any given point. 

The present four-Power financial Consortium, initiated 
by the United States, has made disbandment under 
foreign supervision one of the conditions of new loans. 
The Chinese Government professes to desire this dis- 
bandment, but it will not consent to the necessary 
effective supervision, except under firm pressure. It 
will try its best to " save its face " and preserve its own 
opportunities of " squeeze " as well as those of the 
Tuchuns; a firm front and a clear-cut policy on the 
part of the Consortium Powers in this matter are there- 



118 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

fore absolutely necessary. There must be no more 
independent loans by Japan or by any other Power, no 
further acquiescence in the plea of the mandarins in 
power at Peking that failure to supply them with funds 
will involve a rising of their mutinous troops, with the 
usual looting and bloodshed. That argument has served 
to fill the pockets of the Tuchuns with unearned in- 
crement for the past four years. A revolution would be 
cheaper and healthier than to yield to it again. 

But there is no danger of a real revolution, for the 
simple reason that the masses, and most of the classes, 
are all in sympathy with the disbandment scheme. 
They are tired of being harried and plundered. Certain 
of the Tuchuns would probably defy the Government — 
especially those of the distant provinces of the South and 
West — just as the Southern supporters of the Ming 
dynasty defied the Manchus for some years before they 
were led back into the family fold. But once they were 
convinced that there was no more foreign money to be 
made out of the pretence of civil war, and that public 
opinion was all against them, there would be but little 
heart left in the business of rebellion. Let the work of 
disbandment begin with the nearer Northern and Central 
provinces, where, as I have said, several Tuchuns are 
quite ready to retire on large fortunes into private 
life. Let the disbandment in each case be thorough 
and irrevocable. Let each soldier's pay and arrears be 
issued to him, with transportation to his home if necessary, 
under the direct supervision of a competent representative 
of the Consortium, and only after he has handed over 
his rifle, ammunition, and equipment. Let it be under- 
stood that henceforth the executive and administrative 
authority in each province will be vested in the Civil 
Governor and maintained by his police force; also that 
any military force stationed in the province will be paid 
and controlled by the Central Government. Let half 
a dozen provinces be dealt with in this way and their 
fiscal relations with the capital restored, so that the 



PROBLEM OF RECONSTRUCTION 119 

nucleus of a national revenue is assured, and the rest 
should be only a matter of time and determination. If 
Chihli, Shantung, Shansi, Anhui, Kiangsu, and Chekiang 
can be gently but firmly induced to support an authorita- 
tive Government at Peking, instead of their present 
predatory barons and bandits, and if Peking, receiving 
regular remittances from these rich provinces, is thus 
enabled to command the loyal services of a reliable 
fighting force, the combative ardour of the Southern 
chiefs would fade like the smile of the Cheshire cat. For 
their armies have lived for booty, not for battles, and 
the last thing that they desire is real fighting. They 
know that no Parliament is worth it. 

Here let me digress to observe that, as a matter of 
internal politics, the composition and command of the 
Central Government's standing Army present certain 
obvious difficulties. Not only will the fierce jealousy of 
rival chieftains be aroused (as it was last summer in the 
case of Tuan Chi-jui and Little Hsii) if any party waxes 
strong enough to deny the others a share of the spoil, 
but there must always be a risk, as matters stand, that 
any powerful Commander-in-Chief may be tempted to 
attempt a coup d'etat on his own account, like that of 
General Chang Hsiin in 1917. But this is a risk which 
must be taken — one cannot make omelettes without 
breaking eggs — and the prospect of a Dictatorship, such 
as Yuan Shih-k'ai exercised for three years, is greatly 
preferable to the prospect of interminable strife. Above 
all else to-day, China needs a wise, strong leader who 
shall give the people peace. But of his coming, there is, 
alas, as yet no sign. 

In connection with the scheme for the disbandment 
of the troops, it has been suggested by the Chinese that, 
in order to prevent the disbanded men from becoming 
bandits and freebooters, the foreign Powers should 
undertake to provide funds for their employment on 
road-making, or other public works, for a term of years. 
This, be it observed, is merely an old mandarin dodge in 



120 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

a new dress — an attempt to obtain a little more ready 
money by appealing to the credulity or the benevolence 
of the foreigner. Assuming that the number of bona-fide 
soldiers to be disbanded in the first instance is about 
600,000 men (a liberal figure if the four " rebel " provinces 
of the South are not included), it is simply ludicrous to 
suggest that they could not find their way back peacefully 
into civil life without financial assistance, when once they 
have received the full amount of pay and arrears due to 
them. To say that they would become bandits and 
outlaws, is to cast immediate doubts upon any scheme 
of disbandment which is not rigorously supervised by 
foreign experts, ' and to emphasise the fact that these 
must be experts with the temperament of the man from 
Missouri. Disbanded and unpaid soldiers who carry 
their rifles into private life are likely to become brigands, 
no doubt ; but it would go very hard with any Chinese 
who tried to terrorise his fellow-countrymen in his native 
place without weapons and merely on the strength of 
his military reputation. There is always a submerged 
tenth in China, an element of disorder, hungry and eager 
for pillage and plunder whenever the strong arm of 
authority is relaxed, but with these the community may 
be trusted to deal in its own drastic way, sooner or later. 
With the armed and semi-organised plunderers of the 
Tuchuns' armies, the case is different. Against them 
the common people are defenceless. 

As a matter of expediency, it might be found advisable 
to organise a Public Works Commission, for the con- 
struction of roads, railways, river conservancy, and other 
much-needed improvements. These would provide em- 
ployment, not only for ex-soldiers, but for a much more 
deserving class, the innocent victims of floods and famines. 
It might even be expedient at first to allow payment for 
such public works to be defrayed out of a foreign loan, 
but this only on condition that every dollar of the money 
be accounted for, with proper vouchers, under the expert 
direction of responsible foreigners, Broadly speaking, 



PROBLEM OF RECONSTRUCTION 121 

and except to meet special emergencies, borrowing, for 
anything except legitimate self-supporting enterprises, 
should be sternly discouraged. This obviously means a 
clear-cut policy and concerted action between the Govern- 
ments concerned, not only towards the insatiable borrower, 
but towards the highly respectable lenders, the banks 
and financial syndicates, whose lucrative business of 
bond-selling has contributed in no small degree to hasten 
China's progress towards insolvency. 

To preserve China's self-respect and the smooth working 
of the necessary measures of reform, it would, of course, 
be best that the initiative should come from the Chinese 
themselves, in the form of a request for the expert assist- 
ance required. In any case China's sovereignty and 
dignity must be preserved, by maintenance of all the 
outward and visible signs of her independent authority. 
But with Young China loudly clamouring at their doors, 
the older and wiser heads, be they mandarins or merchants, 
will never dare openly to advocate foreign financial 
control, even in the matter of disbandment, though 
behind closed doors nearly all of them are ready to 
confess that there is no other way of salvation. Whilst 
at Peking in February last I heard much cautious talk on 
this subject, many fervent wishes expressed, even in 
high places, that England and America might come for- 
ward and help to put an end to the chaos and corruption 
of the Tuchun regime. And there were many who 
attributed the country's present dangers and discontents 
to the social demoralisation born of " Western learning " 
and the revolution — to the younger generation's lack of 
respect for the family system, upon which the whole 
fabric of society depends in the East. These men (some 
of them bear great names) are convinced that only the 
restoration of the Throne can secure respect for the 
Central Government in the provinces, let the Powers do 
what they may in the matter of finance. But as a class 
they are timid, with the ingrained timidity of Orientals — 
fearful of assassination^ fearful of losing their wealth; 



122 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

and their inveterate distrust of each other precludes all 
hope of their displaying any collective and patriotic 
initiative. We saw the same thing in 1900, when the 
Boxers kept the whole Manchu Court and its Chinese 
dignitaries in terrified silence. 

As an indication of the mandarin attitude on the 
subject of disbandment, the attitude which has con- 
tinually distinguished both sides at the make-believe 
Peace Conference at Shanghai, the " Plan for the Military 
and Civil Reorganisation of China," submitted to that 
Conference in 1919 by Chu Chi-chien, is worthy of atten- 
tion. Chu Chi-chien, a Southerner, age about fifty, is an 
official of unusually wide experience, courage and organis- 
ing ability. By conviction a staunch Monarchist, he 
supported Yuan Shih-k'ai's attempt to restore the Throne 
in 1916, and after Yuan's death retired for a while from 
public life, to manage a colliery in Shantung. During 
the last years of the Manchu dynasty he held many posts, 
first under the Viceroy of Chihli, then as Chief of Police 
at Peking, and finally under the Viceroy Hsii (now 
President of the Republic) in Manchuria. In all of these 
he displayed unusual energy and initiative. After 1912, 
under the Republic, he held office, first as Minister of 
Communications, and then as Minister of the Interior. 
To him are due the present satisfactory condition of the 
roads, police and municipal administration at Peking. 
When, therefore, at the President's request, he accepted 
the post of chief Northern delegate to the Peace Con- 
ference at Shanghai, something different from the 
usual mandarin line of thought was expected from him. 
The hope was doomed to disappointment. His plan for 
the reorganisation of China might have been compiled 
by the greybeards of the Board of Revenue under the 
Manchus : its figures and arguments are the stuff that 
mandarin dreams are made of, having no relation to 
actualities. He quoted from the national Budget as 
confidently as Sun Yat-sen himself, cheerfully ignoring 
the fact that the thing itself exists only in name; and 



PROBLEIM OF RECONSTRUCTION 123 

his conclusion of the whole matter, as far as disbandment 
was concerned, amounted to a proposal to reduce the 
existing number of troops (which he put at 1,300,000) 
by half, at a cost of over $200,000,000, to be borrowed 
abroad. 

Mr. Chu prefaced this modest scheme with the observa- 
tion that, since the Great War, the world has come to 
" seek a new order, in which right will reign, reason will 
rule, justice will prevail, and happiness will be the pursuit 
of life. It is no exaggeration," he declares, " to say that 
the dawn of a happier period is imminent — so imminent, 
indeed, that in this very country strong efforts are being 
made to effect a reorganisation which will lay the national 
foundation." The Tuchuns' delegates in meeting 
assembled were, no doubt, impressed (they have heard 
of a good many New Eras dawning since 1911), but, 
whatever their views on the millennium, they certainly 
agreed with his practical conclusion, namely, that " in the 
last analysis, no change can be effected without money, 
and any social structure based on an insufficient financial 
foundation is bound to fall." It was not a very lofty 
conception of the true foundation of the new order, but 
it undoubtedly represented every mandarin's ideas of 
political economy. 

Coming to the Army, Mr. Chu estimated that " there 
are not less than one hundred Army Corps at present in 
the country." In another place he gave the actual 
figures (on paper) for each province, showing a grand 
total of 1,290,657 men, of whom 540,344 were supposed 
to be under the order of the Central Government. "He 
proposed to disband the " superfluous troops " of the 
Central Government and of the provinces simultane- 
ously, the operation to take a year or eighteen months. 
He advised that " the Ministry of War and the pro- 
vincial authorities should jointly be held responsible 
for the disbanding of those troops which are considered 
unnecessary." As each Tuchun naturally considers the 
troops of his neighbours to be unnecessary, and as 



124 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

none of them recognises the authority of Peking, the 
scheme was not Hkely to bring China much nearer to 
the dawn. It ignored the vital point of the whole 
question, namely, how to guarantee that the troops, once 
disbanded, would not reappear forthwith under other 
names and other commanders? Mr. Chu incidentally 
referred to the fact that, in 1913, a foreign " reorganisa- 
tion " loan was raised and with it thirty Army Corps 
were disbanded at a cost of $30,000,000. Some 
316,000 soldiers and 19,000 officers were then supposed 
to have retired into civil life. But he said nothing of 
the equally in1;eresting fact that the Chinese Army (on 
paper) is no smaller to-day than before that disbandment 
took place — in other words, that the " reorganisation 
loan " reform was a sorry farce, profitable only to the 
officials and financiers concerned. 

I draw attention to this officially proposed scheme 
because, in spite of its almost childish crudity, it indicates 
some of the difficulties with which the present Consortium 
Powers' representatives will be confronted when they 
come to discuss practical details with the Chinese 
Government. The results of the 1913 loan have proved 
conclusively that no further assurances or half measures 
will serve in the vital matter of supervision over ex- 
penditure. Nobody doubts for a moment that the 
whole Chinese Army would be delighted to return to its 
ancestral homes with all arrears of pay and a three 
months' bonus. The question is, however, who is going 
to prevent the Tuchuns from replacing them next 
morning by a new set of loot-hungry coolies ? 

Mr. Chu's memorandum, for all its vagueness, throws a 
good deal of light upon the pitiful plight to which the 
Chinese Government has been reduced by the corruption 
of its own officials and the refusal of the provinces to 
remit their quota of revenues. " The Army," he declared 
in a sudden burst of frankness, " has become an insup- 
portable burden to the nation; until the military are 
permanently deprived of their usurped power, it is vain 



PROBLEM OF RECONSTRUCTION 125 

to look for any real improvements in the civil administra- 
tion." Yet, realising this, his only remedy was " a 
foreign loan which will cover all these items," its proceeds 
to be divided between Peking and the provinces. There 
is no word in all his elaborate plan for the " proper and 
efficient audit " to which the Chinese Government pledged 
itself when borrowing in 1913, and which they then failed 
to carry out. 

Writing of those loan negotiations, the late Mr. Willard 
Straight, then representative of the American financial 
group, observed : " The Chinese officials charged with 
the expenditure of the loan funds had placed every 
obstacle in the way of a proper and efficient audit, to 
which they had agreed." Because of their bad faith in 
this matter, the Consortium of that day stipulated that 
" China should herself create a system of audit in which 
foreigners should be employed, with powers not merely 
advisory, but also executive, so as to ensure the effective 
expenditure of loan funds borrowed, for the purposes 
specified." Here we have the gist of the whole matter. 
The " reorganisation loan " of 1913 produced a loan, but 
no reorganisation, in so far as the disbandment of troops 
was concerned. It led to the establishment of foreign 
supervision over the revenues of the Salt Gabelle, with 
immediate benefit to China's finances, but the Audit 
Department has never been anything more than an empty 
name, and its foreign adviser a monumental figure- 
head. Every politician in the country, irrespective of 
party, has opposed the effective supervision of loan funds 
expenditure, for the simple reason that it means the 
curtailment of lucrative opportunities. If China is to 
be saved, this opposition must be overcome; and it can 
be overcome if the new Consortium represents a common 
purpose of disinterested goodwill towards China, and 
united action between the Governments concerned. The 
problem of the Tuchuns' armies is urgent and vital ; the 
manner in which it is dealt with will show whether there 
is any hope of effective reconstruction or not. 



126 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

Under the scheme of reorganisation which has been 
roughly outHned in London and New York by the British 
and American delegates to the Consortium, the question of 
disbandment figures on the agenda; but its place upon 
the list of subjects tabled for discussion by the financial 
groups, and the agenda list as a whole, would appear to 
indicate that neither the banking groups nor the Govern- 
ments behind them yet recognise the paramount im- 
portance of this question. Indeed, the conditions under 
which the new four-Power Consortium has come into 
being, and the utterances of its chief spokesmen, have 
hitherto breathed a spirit of vague humanism and bene- 
volent intentions which, however admirable, are some- 
what difficult to associate with the natural aspirations 
and methods of financial syndicates. Mr. Thomas W, 
Lamont (representing J. P. Morgan & Co.) declares, for 
example, that the four Powers have come together in 
the forming of the Consortium because they had decided 
" to put an end to the old pre-war system of international 
jealousies and rivalry." Sir Charles Addis put the same 
thing in simpler words when he defined the principle on 
which the new Consortium is founded as " the substitution 
of international co-operation in China for international 
competition." So far, so good; but even at this stage 
the fact confronts us that, as a matter of goodwill and 
freewill, the Chinese are unlikely to encourage the 
abolition of competition; and it is not recorded that 
international jealousies ceased to play their part when, 
in order to put an end to competition, the Germans 
were admitted into the old Consortium in 1909. But 
let that pass. The new Consortium has, at all events, 
achieved the first requisite of success in its working 
understanding with the Japanese Government on the 
subject of future enterprises and concessions in Manchuria 
and Mongolia. It has also done good work in its agree- 
ment for the unification of the whole of the railway 
system in China, though it remains to be seen whether 
a Railway Board under a Chinese Minister, assisted by 




^^ 



B. T. Prideau.x] 

THINGS ANCIENT AND MODERN (iN A TEMPLE AT HANGCHOW) 



PROBLEM OF RECONSTRUCTION 127 

four foreign engineers of different nationalities, is a 
practical proposition. For the rest, it is apparently 
content to rely upon the " new spirit " in China to make 
international co-operation pleasant and profitable for 
all concerned. Writing to the New York Times last 
July, Mr. Lamont explained the new policy toward 
China, " a policy made possible through American 
initiative," in the following significant passage : 

" China herself has, in the five years of the war, under- 
gone great changes. Outwardly, to be sure, she bears 
an appearance of disorganisation, but underneath there 
flows a new and powerful current of nationality, a spirit 
fostered by the great and influential student bodies, by 
many earnest intellectuals, former pupils of American 
missionaries, who are now giving their lives to develop 
China from a people into a nation, so that the Powers 
recognised that it was no longer a slumbering giant 
with which they had to deal, but one waking into a 
national self-consciousness." 

Mr. Lament's tribute to the political activities of 
American missionaries is interesting, but readers familiar 
with the realities of life in China are likely to concur in 
the opinion that, approached in this spirit, the problem 
of disbandment is not likely to be solved by the Con- 
sortium; moreover, between the lines of the utterances 
of its chief sponsors, one perceives that, in spite of this 
Wilsonian idealism, as practical men they are not asking 
too much from the new spirit, or asking it with any great 
urgency. According to Sir Charles Addis, whose know- 
ledge of the East is considerably greater than that of his 
American colleague, " China can only be saved by her 
own exertions." Nor is he under any illusions concerning 
the Consortium. "It is at present only a machine. 
Before it becomes a living organism, it must have breathed 
into it the spirit of life." In his opinion, " China 
would be well advised to accept this offer in the spirit 
in which it is made. It may be that she will reject it. 
Even so, the Consortium will remain. ... It may even 



128 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

serve, by God's grace, as a means to lay one more stone 
on the foundation of the temple of peace." 

God's grace will have to be very bountifully bestowed 
if the business of cosmopolitan finance is to become a 
corner-stone of that temple. But grace or no grace, it is 
evident, I think, that if the commercial Powers really 
desire to put an end to chaos in China, they will need to 
devise some form of concerted action and machinery 
other than that of a group of syndicates, whose ultimate 
objects, say what you will, are financial, and whose 
natural inclination, in avoiding competition, must be to 
follow the line of least resistance. It is also evident 
(Mr. Lament himself must see it) that, so far as Young 
China is concerned, a Consortium is damned at the 
outset which accepts Japan's position in Shantung as 
chose jugee. Finally, it is absolutely certain that the 
political faction in power at Peking, no matter what its 
name and antecedents, will not accept the Consortium's 
proffered " co-operation " so long as they can borrow 
elsewhere, unless they are sure in advance that they will 
still be able to reduce to a dead letter the conditions of 
a loan agreement which stipulate for strict supervision 
over the expenditure of loan funds, and especially of 
funds borrowed for the disbandment of troops. It may, 
therefore, safely be predicted that, unless the Govern- 
ments concerned place the question of disbandment in 
its right place, at the head of the Consortium's agenda, 
and insist upon it in a manner very different to that of 
those who proffer loans, the Tuchuns' armies will not 
be disbanded, and the Consortium will continue to 
devote its activities and resources to matters of immediate 
financial interest, such as currency reform and railway 
construction. The crucial problem will stiU remain 
unsolved. 

Even assuming, however, that the problem of dis- 
bandment shall have been partially solved by united 
action of the Powers, and the provincial administration 
transferred from the military to the civil authorities ; 



PROBLEM OF RECONSTRUCTION 129 

even if we assume that gradually, province by province, 
the Central Government's authority and fiscal machinery 
have been restored and parliamentary government made 
more responsible and more representative : the real 
task of reconstruction will only have begun, will, in fact, 
have then been rendered possible. The reorganisation 
of the country's civil administration, finances, railways, 
and S3^stem of justice, together with measures for the 
development of its economic resources, will still necessi- 
tate years of honest patriotic effort on the part of the 
Chinese themselves. Given peace within their borders, 
and a genuine desire on the part of the friendly Powers 
to assist them, one may reasonably hope that the thing 
can be done. Honesty in the public service can only be 
secured from without; but, given this, there is enough 
intelHgence, administrative ability and patriotism avail- 
able in China to make her a prosperous and united nation 
within a comparatively short space of time. 

It is important to remember that insistence upon the 
vital condition of a " proper and efficient audit " of official 
accounts, wherever foreign loans are involved, need not 
in any way conflict with the maintenance of China's 
sovereignty, unimpaired and unthreatened. On the 
contrary, it offers the only possible chance of preserving 
that sovereignty and of gradually enabling China to 
regain her proper place and dignity in the comity of 
nations. Nor does it involve any new departure. It 
merely means the extension of a system which, with 
China's consent, and to her infinite advantage, has 
already been in force for seventy years. Had it not been 
for the revenues honestly collected and regularly remitted 
to the Central Government by the Imperial Maritime 
Customs since the days of the Taiping rebellion, China 
would long since have been faced with bankruptcy and 
all that it entails. The Customs service, international in 
its personnel, was brought into existence for the purpose 
of securing the " proper and efficient audit " which 
Chinese officialdom was unable to supply. But it has 

K 



130 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

never been an imperium in imperio, or anything other 
than a loyal branch of the Chinese public service. 

The same principle has been applied in the case of the 
Imperial railways of North China, a lucrative source of 
revenue to the Chinese Government. By the terms of 
the British loan which provided the capital for building 
the line, supervision of the railway's finances is vested 
in a British accountant. On other Chinese railways 
(such as the Peking-Hankow and the Tientsin-Pukou 
lines), where the principle of financial supervision was 
waived by British and French financiers because of the 
clamour of Young China on the one hand and the intrigues 
of German financiers on the other, the existing state of 
affairs is so undeniably rotten, that it affords the strongest 
possible argument for foreign financial control. Every 
Chinese with whom you discuss the pitiful condition of 
these railways (except the officials directly concerned) 
admits that if they were honestly handled they could 
not fail to become veritable gold-mines for the State. 
As it is, their freight and passenger rates are higher than 
those in England, rolling stock and permanent way are 
in a lamentable state, and practically no provision is 
made for depreciation. Even the special fund set apart 
for the rebuilding of the great bridge over the Yellow 
River on the Peking-Hankow line has disappeared, 
devoured for " administrative expenses " by the man- 
darins of the new dispensation. The day is fast approach- 
ing when foreign financiers will be asked for new loans 
to set these railways in order.^ Will any of the mandarins 
of Young China and Old, who have made fortunes by 
starving and squeezing these railways, subscribe towards 
such loans? No, they will apply to the foreigner for 

1 Since the above was written the British, and Chinese Corpor- 
ation's representative in China has inforraed the shareholders that 
the net revenues of railways supervised by the Ministry of 
Communications have increased by 64 per cent, since 1915. 
At the same meeting it was announced that the Corporation had 
made a loan of $2,000,000 to the Chinese Government for the 
purchase of rolling stock, etc., for the Hupei-Hunan section of 
the Hankow-Canton Railway ! 



PROBLEM OF RECONSTRUCTION 131 

further funds, while denouncing the idea of financial 
control in the name of " sovereign rights." 

Inasmuch as nearly every source of public revenue in 
China has been pledged for the service of foreign loans, 
the Powers behind the Consortium are now in a position 
to extend the principle of financial control, in China's 
own interest, and to insist upon its effective application. 
Just as the revenues of the Salt Gabelle have steadily 
increased since even a partial system of foreign super- 
vision was introduced in 1913, so reliable sources of 
income can be developed from the land tax, the wine 
and tobacco taxes (recently pledged for an American 
loan), and from the opium trade. (The tax on opium- 
growing, now independently levied by many provincial 
authorities, is bound to become a recognised and lucrative 
Government monopoly in the near future.) China's 
sources of national revenue are, I repeat, quite sufficient 
for the needs of government; all that is required is to 
protect their output from the hands of predatory officials 
and to restore the fiscal arrangements destroyed by the 
revolution. 

During my recent visit to Peking, it seemed to me, 
when discussing the situation there, that the essential 
features on which I have laid stress are in danger of being 
frequently overlooked, if not submerged, by reason of 
the multitude of counsellors, experts, advisers, and Special 
Commissioners who live, move, and have their being in 
the vicinity of the Legations and the Presidential mansion. 
Of many nations and kindreds is the lost legion of the 
Chinese Government's foreign advisers. It includes all 
sorts and conditions of men, from ex-Ministers, ex- 
missionaries, and professional men of good repute, down 
to hirelings of the baser sort and the hungry jackals of 
jpurnahsm. From the cynical Chinese point of view, 
many of these advisers have been engaged on the lucus a 
non lucendo principle, that is to say, they are neither 
asked nor expected to advise. Sometimes they are 
simply window-dressing, inanimate figures, intended to 



132 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

inspire confidence in the foreign buyer of Chinese bonds ; 
sometimes they have been imposed on the Chinese 
Government as the result of international jealousies 
arising in the field of international finance. Many of 
them are held in reserve for use in emergencies, either as 
scapegoats or buffers, in the event of serious difficulties 
with their respective Legations. But whatever their 
record or their role, the result of their collective opinions 
and activities is to confuse the mind of any earnest seeker 
after truth, especially if he be a newcomer and unfamiliar 
with the peculiar methods of Oriental statecraft. 

Over and above the voices of the professional " advisers " 
directly and permanently employed by the Chinese 
Government, there are those of a number of foreign 
experts, appointed or engaged to report on technical 
subjects, or to represent the special interests of actual 
or potential creditors, experts in law, finance, railways, 
salt, or police organisation. Behind these, again, a 
confused but indefatigable chorus, are the voices of 
the amateur advisers — missionaries, journalists, sincere 
friends of China — ^what you will. And in each of these 
classes there are to be found men whose professional 
bias or individual interest leads them to proclaim their 
own particular remedies for the ills that afflict the State. 
Thus while one clamours for currency reform, another 
will pin his faith to the League of Nations; while one 1 
sees salvation in the revision of the tariff, another looks 
for it in the making of roads and railways. And so, 
amidst the money-changers, scribes, and doctors, there 
arises a cloud of words which obscures the fundamental 
truth, that China is financially and politically bankrupt, 
and that nothing but honesty of administration, com- 
pulsorily imposed, can save her. This aspect of the 
situation is one which the professional adviser generally 
either takes for granted or discreetly ignores. 

And all the while, in the background, silent, inscrutable, 
but ever vigilant, are the expert advisers of Dai Nippon, 
some four hundred Japanese military officers, attached 




B. T. Pridcaux] 

" THOSE THAT DIG AND WEAVE, THAT PLANT AND BUILD. 




J Us I A ,-)ON(j AT TWILIGHT. 



PROBLEM OF RECONSTRUCTION 133 

to China's Northern armies in fulfilment of the secret pact 
of 1918. Here, again, you have a fundamental fact of 
the situation. For it is evident that no international 
Consortium, intended to reform the administrative abuses 
and financial chaos at present existing, can ever be 
anything more than a pious aspiration, unless Japan 
agrees to abandon the policy foreshadowed by the Twenty- 
One Demands of May 1915. No concerted action can 
be inaugurated unless she decides, once and for all, to 
abide by the terms of the Anglo- Japanese Alliance, and 
to co-operate with her ally in a sincere effort to prevent 
further disintegration in China. Nor is it possible for 
Japan to become an honest partner in the Consortium 
so long as the terms of her secret Military Agreements 
remain in force and undisclosed. The exclusion of 
Japan's special interests in Manchuria and Mongolia from 
the scope of the Consortium's operations was a matter of 
secondary importance as compared with the effect of 
this Military Agreement. Not only does it paralyse the 
sovereignty of China at its source, but it precludes all 
hope of ever restoring the unity of the country. It 
constitutes, in fact, a violation of the fundamental 
principles for which the Anglo-Japanese Alliance was 
made. Unless it be frankly abandoned, the Consortium 
is stultified from the outset, and its activities can serve no 
purpose other than to promote the ends of financiers. 
This being so, it is remarkable that the Consortium 
Powers, and particularly the United States, should have 
strained at the Manchurian gnat and swallowed the 
camel of the Military Agreement. 

To sum up : the situation of China is critical and the 
need for remedial measures urgent. I have endeavoured 
to suggest how these may be applied with some hope of 
success, and that the common interest of the commercial 
Powers concerned makes it advisable to apply them 
without further delay. That the country as a whole 
would be grateful for the restoration of law and order, 
no matter from what source, is indisputable. There 



134 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

remains therefore only the question, is any continuity of 
concerted action between the Powers, and particularly, 
in the first place, between Great Britain and the United 
States, a matter of practical possibility, and, if so, under 
what conditions? Public opinion in America, so far as 
one can gauge it, would lead to the conclusion that no 
clear-cut policy in Far Eastern affairs can be expected 
from the State Department for some months at least. If 
that be so, China's difficulties and dangers are likely to 
be greatly increased, and with them the risk of serious 
complications in the future. As far as Japan is concerned, 
everything justifies the belief that the moment is oppor- 
tune for coming to a new and comprehensive under- 
standing, which would make the Consortium a practical 
instrument for reconstructive work in China. My 
reasons for this belief are based on a close study of the 
present position of affairs in Japan, to which the reader's 
attention will now be directed. 



CHAPTER VII 

JAPAN : HER VITAL PROBLEM 

If, as I have endeavoured to show, the only practical 
way of preserving China's independence as a nation lies 
in the adoption by the Consortium Allies of a common 
policy of helpful and disinterested friendship towards her, it 
is evident that, in the first place, everything possible should 
be done to bring about more cordial relations between 
the United States and Japan. No one who takes an 
interest in this question can travel, as I have recently 
done, in the United States and in the Far East, without 
perceiving that on both sides the differences and mis- 
understandings that have arisen during the last few 
years are often reflected in a dangerous state of tension. 
Yet there is really nothing of irreconcilable difference 
in the questions now at issue between the two nations, 
nothing which could not be satisfactorily settled with a 
little goodwill and a sense of fair play on both sides. 
The trouble is, that the goodwill is not likely to come 
into play so long as a powerful section of the Press in 
both countries panders to the Jingo element by fomenting 
jealous suspicions and exciting popular passion. Neither 
America nor Japan wants war, either over the Californian 
question or Shantung or Manchuria, but in both countries 
there are elements at work whose active propaganda 
tends to produce increasing irritation, and to create in 
the public mind a belief that sooner or later war is 
inevitable. 

It were idle to shut one's eyes to the fact that the elimina- 
tion of Russia, and the emergence of the United States 
as a great military Power, have completely changed the 
balance of power in the Far East, and that, as a result, 

135 



186 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

new lines of national antagonism, new conflicts of economic 
interests, have become manifest. It is also undeniable 
that, so long as China remains in her present state, she 
must be a source of danger to the peace of the world. ^ 
Nevertheless, if there be any virtue in statesmanship, 
anything vital in the new impulses and ideals which have 
sought expression in the League of Nations, it should be 
quite possible for America and Japan to work together 
on terms of friendship in the Far East, commercial rivalry 
and differences of opinion notwithstanding. 

But " he who knows only his own side, knows little of 
that." Most of the present misunderstandings and con- 
sequent irritation are not due to any distinctive racial 
antagonism, but merely to popular ignorance. One 
half of the world does not know how the other half lives. 
It is very necessary that the American people should know 
how Japan lives, in order to see the Far Eastern problem 
in its true light. Humanly speaking, the salvation of 
China and the peace of the Orient depend largely upon 
a just appreciation of the whole situation by public 
opinion in the United States; given this, it should be 
possible to find a solution for all outstanding questions, 
even such questions as the Yellow Peril and the " open 
door." 

I propose in the first instance to trace the connection 
between Japan's national policies and her economic 
situation, so that the reader may be able to judge whether 
those policies are dictated by a wanton spirit of aggression, 
or by imperative necessity, or by both. It is hardly 
possible for the average foreigner, unless he has seen and 
studied the causes and results of economic pressure in 
the Far East, to make due allowance for the absence in 
Oriental statecraft of the altruism and lofty idealism 
which are so conspicuously associated with American 
statesmanship. Even the most imaginative students at 
a distance can have but a faint conception of the fierceness 
of the struggle for life which was the East's birth-burden 
centuries ago. 



JAPAN: HER VITAL PROBLEM 137 

The results of economic pressure in Japan are far-reach- 
ing, but the problem itself is very simple. It is merely 
a question of providing food for a population which already 
exceeds the limit that the country's soil can support, 
and which is debarred by our Exclusion Acts from seeking 
its livelihood in less congested countries overseas. The 
problem, be it observed, is only one of many manifesta- 
tions of the unpleasant truth, sternly emphasised by the 
World War, that the pressure of population upon the world's 
food supply has become, and must remain, acute. The 
severity of this pressure in Japan is grimly indicated by 
the death-rate, which averages 2i'5 per thousand. 

The fundamental facts of the situation in Japan are : 
(i) That with a birth-rate of 32 per thousand, the popula- 
tion increases annually at the rate of about 750,000; 
(2) that, in the last ten years, the inhabitants of Japan 
proper (that is, excluding Korea and Formosa) have 
increased from 50,000,000 to 57,000,000, giving an average 
of 380 persons to the square mile; (3) that during this 
period, the area of land under cultivation has been increased 
by 5 per cent, and the rice production by 4 per cent., as 
against an increase of 12 per cent, in the number of mouths 
to feed; and (4) that so long as the present birth-rate 
is maintained, the nation must depend more and more 
upon imported food supplies. 

There is no possibility of materially increasing either 
the productivity of the soil or the area under cultivation. 
Certain arm-chair theorists, having in mind the successful 
result of the " Wisconsin Idea " as applied to American 
agriculture, are wont to argue that similar results might 
be obtained by similar methods in China and Japan. 
I have even seen an enthusiastic attempt to introduce 
rice-planting by machinery in China, oblivious of the fact 
that agricultural man-power in that country is far cheaper 
than any fuel-driven machine. Those who have studied 
the matter know that in no other part of the world has 
the productivity of the soil been developed by intensive 
culture as it has been for centuries in China and Japan; 



138 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

nowhere else has the stern law of necessity taught the 
farmer to struggle with such dogged determination against 
the law of diminishing returns. In Japan the rice-fields 
not only fill the valleys, but everywhere on the hill- 
sides you will find them, terraced and artificially irrigated 
at an incredible cost of human labour. As I journeyed 
last February from Mogi to Kobe, by the railway which 
skirts the beautiful shore of the Inland Sea, it seemed to 
me that the villages have grown perceptibly larger and the 
rice-fields smaller, in the last ten years. The dead take 
up no portion of the food-growing area here, as they do 
in China ; but one cannot see the children swarming in 
these close-clustering villages without asking oneself, 
can these tiny fields be still further sub-divided, and if not, 
what peaceful solution of the problem can there be other 
than in wholesale emigration ? ^ 

In August 1918, the steadily increasing cost of rice 
led to serious rioting at Kobe, Tokyo, and other industrial 
centres; the violence of the crowd and the organised 
character of their attacks upon the property of war 
millionaires, were very significant features of the outbreak, 
and of the social changes which industrialism has produced 
and is producing in the larger cities of Japan. The dis- 
turbances were not quelled before a good many civilians 
had been injured and much property destroyed. In 
the end, the Government practically justified the rioters 
by making large grants of free rice to the distressed dis- 
tricts, and these were followed up by a public subscription 
list, in which the war millionaires figured conspicuously. 
The moral of this outbreak has not been lost, either on the 
Government or on the classes immediately affected by 
the high price of food and the increasing burdens of 
taxation. 

1 According to figures recently published, there are 6,000,000 
farmer families in Japan, whose average holding is 2-45 acres. 
The Bureau of Land Development in the Board of Agriculture is 
endeavouring to obtain Government grants in aid for farmers 
breaking up and tilling lands of the poorer kind at present unculti- 
vated, whereby it is estimated another million families might be 
provided for. 



JAPAN: HER VITAL PROBLEM 139 

The general economic condition of the masses in Japan, 
largely resulting from the war, is in some respects very 
similar to that which obtains in England. There is a 
new upper class vulgarised by its wealth, a new lower 
class demoralised by the heady wine of democracy, and 
a middle class pulverised between the two. The profiteer 
is, if anything, more conspicuous in Japan than in America 
or England, for the reason that before the war he was a 
rare bird in these parts ; as in China, the family system 
prevented the accumulation of great wealth in the hands 
of individuals. In 1914 there were only twenty-two 
persons in Japan who paid income tax on fortunes 
declared at over 100,000 yen; in 1918, there were 336, 
and, to judge by the number of new palatial residences 
and motor-cars in Tokyo, the tax collector should be able 
to find a good many more, if there were no holes in his net. 

Generally speaking, the cost of living for the poorer 
class in Tokio has increased more rapidly than in most of 
the world's capitals ; and Tokyo and Osaka are the centres 
from which microbes of unrest are propagated in Japan, 
Taking 1909 as a basis, with the index figure of 100, the 
cost of living for clerical workers had risen to 320 in 
1919, and is now considerably higher. During the same 
period, the incomes of thes^ workers had risen to 227. 
The details on the expenditures side, as worked out from 
the statements of a large number of bank clerks, are 
interesting : 



Items of Expenditure 


1909 


1914 


1919 


Rent . 


12-50 


13-75 


20-63 


Rice 


II-OO 


11-77 


50-05 


Other foods . 


15-50 


16-74 


47-59 


Fuel . 


5-00 


5-60 


17-90 


Clothes 


14-00 


15-68 


58-38 


Car fares 


2-00 


2-58 


3-86 


Sundry items 


40-00 


44-80 


123-20 




lOO-OO 


IIO-Q2 


320-61 



In the case of manual labourers, the figures (compiled 
from the statements of coal-heavers, stevedores, carters, 



140 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 



and scavengers) show that, whereas the increase in the 
cost of Hving was practically the same as in the case of 
clerical workers, their incomes rose from loo to 494, or 
more than twice as much. Also, it will be observed from 
the following figures, that the increase in the cost of rice 
affects the working classes in Japan even more directly 
than the price of bread affects the same classes in Europe. 



Items of Expenditure 


1909 


1914 


1919 


Rent , 


i6'Oo 


17.60 


26-40 


Rice 


. 1870 


20-0I 


85-09 


Other foods . 


. 18-50 


19-98 


56-80 


Fuel . 


6-IO 


6-83 


21-84 


Clothes 


7-30 


8-i8 


30-44 


Car fares 


2-50 


3-23 


3-58 


Sundry expenses . 


. 30-90 


34.61 


95-17 




lOO-OO 


liO'44 


319.32 



It is small wonder that a ricksha coolie in Tokyo declines 
to work under 4 yen (at present exchange, say, $2' 00) 
per day, and that a carpenter gets 5 yen or more. Small 
wonder that clerks and journalists (reporters are still 
expected to work for 50 yen a month) now prefer to 
join the ranks of manual labour. For the cost of respecta- 
bility is becoming prohibitive; the price of clothes is 
actually an insoluble problem for many middle-class 
families, having risen nearly 400 per cent, in the last five 
years. Here are the figures for the retail prices of 
commodities in Tokyo : 



Foodstuffs 

Fuel 

Building materials 

Clothes . 

Miscellaneous . 



Number of 
Articles Taken 




Price 




1909 


1914 


1919 


33 


100 


107 


296 


4 


100 


112 


362 


10 


100 


97 


360 


17 


100 


108 


419 


6 


100 


127 


259 



Roughly speaking, the rice problem began to assume 
its present chronic form after 1915. The nation's annual 
rice crop may be put at an average of 56,000,000 kokii, 
and the consumption per head at i"o8 koku (say, 5| 
bushels). Therefore, we find that in 1918 the country 



JAPAN: HER VITAL PROBLEM 141 

required to import 7,500,000 koku of rice, of which 
4,500,000 came from foreign countries, and the rest from 
Korea and Formosa. As in England, the increase of 
population has been chiefly urban, following directly 
from the nation's industrial expansion; during the last 
decade the number of agricultural families has remained 
practically unchanged, but they now represent only 
54 per cent, of the total population, as against 59.5 
in igog. 

It is evident that, for the moment, and so long as Japan 
remains in a position to purchase the surplus food she 
requires by maintaining a balance of trade in her favour, 
the problem presents no insuperable difficulty. But 
Japanese statesmen take long views, and they realise that 
each year's addition to the population involves a corre- 
sponding increase in the food supply, which can only 
be obtained by the sale of manufactured goods in foreign 
markets, where Japan will have to face the keenest 
competition. The nation, debarred from emigration to 
the American and Australian continents, is, in fact, faced 
with three alternatives : (i) a reduction of the birth- 
rate; (2) increase in food supplies, to be obtained by 
successful industrial expansion ; and (3) territorial expan- 
sion into the less-populated regions of the Asiatic continent. 
A reduction of the birth-rate is not to be expected, so 
long as either of the other two alternatives is possible, 
because it must involve a radical change of the race-mind 
and social system. Looking to the immediate future, 
Japanese statesmanship is therefore compelled to adopt 
one or both of the other alternatives. Here you have 
in a nutshell the explanation, if not the justification, 
of all Japan's diplomatic and economic activities in the 
Far East ; of her feverish eagerness to secure new sources 
of supply of the raw materials needed by her expanding 
industries; of her claims to "special interests" in the 
undeveloped regions of Manchuria, Mongolia, and possibly 
Siberia. Japan, to put it plainly, is overcrowded and 
must overflow, just as Great Britain and other congested 



142 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

countries of Europe have overflowed, but there is no New 
World open to her surplus millions. Her expansion must 
proceed along the line of least resistance, that is to say, 
into China's loosely held and thinly populated dependencies 
of the Asiatic continent. Manchuria and Mongolia are 
thus inevitably destined to follow Korea down the path 
of " geographical gravitation." Morally speaking, and 
from the Chinese point of view, it is, of course, lamentable 
that any nation should expand at another's expense; 
but the struggle for survival between races has not ended 
with the Treaty of Versailles, and the principle of self- 
determination must always remain an empty phrase 
when it comes into contact with a virile instinct of self- 
preservation. As the French say, " Empty stomachs 
have no ears." 

A Japanese writer in the World's Work has put the 
matter succinctly by observing that " the Japanese 
people must either die a saintly death in righteous starva- 
tion, or expand into the neighbour's backyard — and Japan 
is not that much of a saint." The editor of the Tokyo 
Yorodzu, defending his countrymen's right to emigrate 
to Korea, prior to the annexation of 1910, wrote with 
bitter irony, " How shall we dispose of our surplus 
milHons ? Our small country can hardly find room within 
its narrow boundaries to accommodate its yearly increase 
of half a million people. We cannot kill them wholesale, 
nor can we fill up the Sea of Japan and make dry land 
of it for them to settle on. We would like to go to Kansas, 
or anywhere but Hades, where we could escape starvation. 
But however hospitable America may be, she refuses to 
receive so many newcomers all at once. We would wish 
very much to cross over to Australia ; but that is a White 
Man's Land, and although the continent is many times 
larger than Korea and very thinly populated, no coloured 
people are admitted there. We know that Korea is 
thickly populated, but there the least resistance is offered, 
and so we go there, just as Englishmen went to America 
and Australia and elsewhere, forcing the natives to 



JAPAN: HER VITAL PROBLEM 143 

make room for them, in days of yore," (As a matter of 
fact, the density of population in Korea is roughly 50 per 
cent, less than in Japan.) 

It is impossible to discuss any phase or feature of the 
Far Eastern problem with any educated Japanese, from 
the highest statesman to the youngest student, without 
realising how deeply the national mind is imbued with 
a bitter sense of the injustice of the white races, which 
deny the principle of " racial equality " in the Western 
World, while insisting upon the " open door " and " equal 
opportunity " in the East. The resentment felt upon the 
subject of racial discrimination, always widespread and 
bitter, has been greatly aggravated by Mr. Wilson's 
short-sighted handling of this question at Versailles; 
it undoubtedly constitutes the strongest asset of the 
Japanese Military Party and of the Pan- Asian Imperialists, 
who dream, as Germany dreamt, of a great war of con- 
quest and the overlordship of Asia by Dai Nippon. The 
Japanese as a race will never forget that twice, after 
victorious wars fought for the preservation of their 
national security, the white races have intervened on 
the side of the vanquished and practically dictated the 
terms of peace. Japan fought Russia for Korea and 
Manchuria, because Russian domination of those Chinese 
dependencies threatened her very existence as a nation. 
Control of the Korean peninsula is even more vital to 
the national security of Japan than that of Panama to the 
United States or of Egypt to Great Britain, and every 
Japanese chafes, more or less openly, at the discrimination 
which fails to recognise this undeniable fact. 

The " racial equality " decision of the Versailles Con- 
ference remains inexplicable, a colossal and gratuitous 
blunder. Its results, plainly manifested in the deep 
feeling of resentment which prevailed in Japan last year, 
must militate against friendly co-operation for the benefit 
of China, unless the diplomacy of common sense is speedily 
invoked to put the whole matter on a rational basis. 
For what are the facts ? Every one, unless obsessed by 



144 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

the claptrap of catch-words, knew perfectly well that 
when the Japanese delegates at Versailles put forward 
their claim to " racial equality " they had no intention 
of discussing an obviously futile abstraction. What 
they intended to claim, as Marquis Okuma and Marquis 
Saionji have both frankly declared, was equality of treat- 
ment for Japanese in the matter of naturalisation and 
land tenure in the United States and Canada, or, in the 
alternative, a free hand in Manchuria and Shantung. 
But Mr. Wilson and his colleagues allowed the catch-word 
to pass. Common-sense statesmanship would have replied 
that " racial equality " is a meaningless expression. On 
the field of battle, Japan has vindicated her claim to 
equality; in the arts, sciences, and industries, she has a 
record of achievement which admits of no discussion. 
Clear-sighted perception of the real issues involved must 
have led to frank admission of the obvious truth, that 
American and British exclusion laws are not based on 
racial or moral objections, but simply on grounds of 
imperative economic necessity. Racial equality has no 
more to do with the case than the flowers that bloom in 
the spring. If it had, the only thing that could usefully 
be said about it is, that economically the white races 
are unequal to the Asiatics, and that to admit their free 
competition in the labour market would simply mean 
race suicide for the white man. When the academic 
diplomacy of the Peace Conference placed on record its 
denial of the principle of " racial equality " (it might 
just as well have repudiated the signs of the Zodiac), 
it greatly strengthened the hands of the Jingo element 
in Japan. Had Mr. Wilson resisted the Japanese claim 
to equality of treatment as immigrants into the American 
continent on purely economic grounds, his position would 
have been incontestable, and the best elements in Japan 
would have understood and respected his decision. The 
growing force of Japanese Liberalism would have appre- 
ciated the economic argument, whereas insistence on 
racial discrimination has merely served to wound the 




C T. Prideaux 



SCENE IN THE THEATRE QUARTER, KYOTO. 




THE PALACE MOAT, TOKYO. 



JAPAN: HER VITAL PROBLEM 145 

dignity of a people ever keenly sensitive in matters of 
national pride. 

The Japanese delegates might have been reminded, if 
necessary, that aliens have never been entitled to own land 
beyond the limits of the Treaty Ports in Japan, and that 
the Japanese Government denies to the Chinese that 
" racial equality " which it claims from the rest of the 
world. Those Japanese — and they are many — who 
proclaim their country's right to a place in the sun in 
California, Canada, and Mexico, are always quite ready 
to admit that discrimination against the Chinese is reason- 
able and right. The well-known publicist, Mr. Kawakami, 
puts the matter thus : " We say that the United States 
need not extend to the countries not yet admitted into 
the family of civilised Powers, the privileges which she 
has conferred upon the subjects of a country which has 
been recognised as a first-class Power ; and we hope that 
our American critics will give us credit for what we have 
accomplished in the brief period of fifty years, and recog- 
nise that Japan is the only nation in Asia imbued with the 
modern civilisation." There you have the keynote of 
Japan's restless discontent ; her people, citizens of " a 
first-class Power imbued with modern civilisation," are 
excluded from the United States, while Syrians, Hindus^ 
and other Asiatics are admitted. As the Marquis Saionji 
tactfully puts it, " Japan has no intention of ever attempt- 
ing to dictate to another country how it should regulate 
its internal affairs, but our normal human pride would 
always be irritated by specific legal discrimination against 
us as Japanese." To reach an amicable adjustment 
of this delicate question, the issue must be fairly and 
squarely faced, and the truth plainly declared, namely, 
that no white race dares to expose itself to the free com- , 
petition of Asiatic labour. If Hindus and Syrians were' 
to threaten the American continent with immigration in 
large numbers, they also would be required to observe 
a " gentleman's agreement." British Columbia has 
denied immigration rights to Hindus. 

L 



\ 



146 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

Debarred from any outlet on the American shores of 
the Pacific, Japan is compelled to seek relief for her surplus 
population and food shortage on the Asiatic continent; 
and everything points to the conclusion that her rulers 
will not consent to allow the country's expansion to be 
confined to Korea and Manchuria. Marquis Saionji, 
for one, has distinctly intimated that they will not do so, 
and every conversation that I have had with responsible 
statesmen and public men in Japan leads me to believe 
that any deliberate attempt to restrict Japan's expansion 
(they may call it " peaceful penetration " in deference 
to the conventions) would unite the entire nation in an 
outburst of patriotic indignation. 

Let me not be misunderstood. Militarism, that is to 
say, the dominance of the Imperialist war-for-war's-sake 
element, is undoubtedly declining in Japan, for reasons 
that will be explained in due course. But Japanese 
patriotism and the spirit of nationalism show no signs of 
diminishing ardour; on the contrary, Japan impresses 
one, almost more than any other country, by the preva- 
lence throughout all classes of society of that spirit which 
Prince Ito described as " full consciousness, confidence, 
and intense interest in the national mission and the 
national destiny." Marquis Okuma seems to voice the 
common national sentiment when, in an article recently 
pubhshed, he says, " I have no doubt that Japan will 
propagate to China and other countries in the Orient, 
whose standard of civilisation is low, her new civilisation, 
which is a product of harmonising the Japanese and Euro- 
pean civilisations. In a sense Japan may be said to have 
the mission of harmonising Eastern and Western civilisa- 
tion and of propagating the new civilisation; nay, I do 
not hesitate to declare that this is her mission." When 
severe economic pressure underlies a virile nation's 
belief in its divine mission, it may be taken for granted, 
I think, that such a nation's claims to expansion are 
not likely to be permanently checked, except by superior 
force. 



JAPAN: HER VITAL PROBLEM 147 

At the same time, everything in Japan's history, since 
her first successful war with China determined the fate 
of Korea, justifies the conclusion that the future policy 
of her far-seeing rulers and their solution of her vital food 
problem will tend rather in the direction of economic 
than of territorial expansion. Several events have 
occurred within the past ten years to discredit the Pan- 
Asian dream of expansion by conquest, and to bring 
her statesmen to look rather to the development of her 
industries and the expansion of her commerce. These 
events, in the order of their importance, are : first, experi- 
ence in Korea and Manchuria has led the Japanese to 
perception of the fact that they are not a colonising race, 
in the sense that the Anglo-Saxons are ; second, the United 
States has come to the front as a great naval and military 
nation, instinctively opposed to the claims of any Asiatic 
Power to overlordship of the Asiatic continent and the 
mastery of the Pacific ; third, there has been a rapid 
growth of unmistakable hostility to Japan in China, 
hostility of a kind that may seriously endanger Japanese 
commerce at its most vital point. 

Ten years ago, when Korea was formally annexed and 
became part of the Japanese Empire, and later, when 
Japan's " special interests " in Manchuria were asserted 
and made effective, it was generally expected that these 
comparatively unpopulated and undeveloped regions 
would rapidly absorb a large number of Japanese emigrants. 
The Japanese themselves undoubtedly hoped for expan- 
sion of this kind, expansion that would tend to relieve 
the pressure of population in the home country. But 
practical experience has shown that the class of emigrant 
who goes to Korea and Manchuria is rarely a tiller of 
the soil : the great majority are artisans, shopkeepers, 
and small traders. In both countries, the population 
of every Japanese Settlement includes a large proportion / 
of restaurant-keepers, photographers, and barbers, trades 
which live largely as parasites on the brothel business. 
The number of Japanese, generally classed as " Geisha " 



148 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

or as waitresses in the official records, is very large ; even 
the smallest towns have their red-light sections, established 
under official auspices. In 1911 there were 134 Japanese 
houses of ill fame in the Korean capital, and the class of 
women inhabiting them was nearly 5 per cent, of the total 
Japanese community. Before the annexation of Korea, 
there were about 170,000 Japanese already established 
in the kingdom, mostly congregated at the Treaty Ports ; 
the increase of their numbers during the last ten years 
has been less than 200,000. Similarly, Japanese emigration 
to Manchuria has been comparatively small and chiefly 
limited to town-dwellers. The broad fact stands out in 
both countries that, as a day-labourer or farmer, the 
Japanese emigrant cannot compete either with the native 
or with the Chinese settler. He is like the Frenchman, in 
t,hat his heart is never in the colonising business ; he goes 
to a foreign country, not to find there a new home, but 
in the hope of making enough money to retire on a modest 
competence to his native land. The following figures, 
taken from statistics supplied to me by the courtesy of 
President Inouye, of the Bank of Japan, are instructive : 

Number of Japanese Resident Abroad 

191 3 191S 

In Asia (chiefly Males 64,174 103,991 

China and Females 56,136 87,996 

Manchuria) 120,310 191,987 

Europe Males 1,046 875 

Females 171 124 

1,217 999 

North America Males 79,652 98,059 

Females 13,849 37.555 

93,501 135.614 

South America Males 12,435 20,459 

Females 5,102 10,702 

17.535 31. 161 



Oceania Males 68,ig6 82,683 

Females 34*189 51.378 

102,385 — 134.061 

334.950 493.845 



JAPAN: HER VITAL PROBLEM 149 

Having recently travelled through Manchuria and 
Korea after an absence of ten years, I have no hesitation 
in saying that in both countries the natives are very much 
better off to-day, economically speaking, than they were 
before the coming of the Japanese. Their standard of 
living has been materially raised, the bandit has practically 
gone out of business in most districts, and a man may enjoy 
in security the fruits of his labour (political agitation 
excepted). The local Japanese administration has made its 
mistakes, Japanese agents have done those things which 
they ought not to have done, and the Japanese soldiers 
in Korea have committed acts of brutal severity ; but the 
policy of the Imperial Government on the whole has been 
wise, far-seeing, and liberal. Japan has spent a great 
deal of money in both countries (far more than she is 
ever likely to get out of them), and their natural resources 
are being systematically developed in a way that no Korean 
or Chinese administration could ever think of attempting. 
But the fact stands out that all this development is adminis- 
trative, and that most of the actual work is done by native 
labour. It is part of the Japanese Government's liberal 
policy of feeding Japan's home industries by the establish- 
ment, with all possible safeguards for the future, of new 
sources of raw material and new markets for the consump- 
tion of Japanese manufactures. It is a conquest by 
railway and bank, development unaccompanied by any 
large-scale movement of Japanese settlers or soldiery, 
and this, for the simple reason that Chinese labour is 
far more economical and more efficient than Japanese; 
even the Korean peasantry are superior on their own ground 
to the Japanese immigrant farmer. The final results 
from all this activity are, of course, auxihary to the 
industries and commerce of Japan, but, in the meanwhile, 
those who have benefited most materially from her peace- 
ful penetration in this region are the Koreans, the Man- 
churian farmers, and the Chinese labourers, who come 
swarming in by thousands from Shantung. 
You need not go far in any direction to find conclusive 



150 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

proof that, whether it be at farming, manual labour, 
trade or industrial work, the Chinese are vastly superior 
to the Japanese, just as they are to every other race; 
that is to say, they can produce better work and at a 
lower cost. Slowly but surely, in every place where the 
Chinese enjoy equal opportunities, the wealth of that 
place becomes theirs, as Hong Kong and the Malay 
States can testify. In Dalny to-day, there are no Japanese 
menservants ; even the ricksha coolies are Chinese. At 
the docks of that flourishing Japanese colony, nearly 
all the manual labour, and a great deal of the office work, 
is done by Chinese. When I asked Dr. Uyeda, the 
Secretary of the South Manchurian Railway, why he 
employed a Chinese rather than a Japanese butler, his 
answer was simple, " Because as a servant the Chinaman 
is cheaper and better." Which accounts, does it not, for 
the small number of emigrants from Japan to Manchuria ? 
In Mongolia it is the same story. In speaking of 
Mongolia most people probably have the impression that 
the country still consists, as it did in the day of the Manchus, 
of rolling pastoral lands, sparsely inhabited by nomad 
Mongol tribes. But, as a matter of fact, a broad tide of 
Chinese settlers, mostly hardy farmers from Shantung, 
has been steadily flowing northwards throughout all 
that region ever since the Mongolian Colonisation Bureau 
of the Chinese Government began work in earnest in 1906, 
under Chu Chi Chien. (This official, it will be remembered, 
is he who gave to Peking its good roads and efficient 
police.) I recollect discussing this colonisation scheme 
with the Viceroy of Manchuria at Moukden in 1907; he 
and the Governor Tang Shao-yi were very enthusiastic 
on the subject, declaring that in ten years' time prosperous 
towns and villages would be springing up and well-tilled 
fields would replace the barren camping-grounds of the 
Mongols. And so it is ; the peaceful invasion of Chinese 
settlers has been steadily advancing, at the rate of about 
four miles a year, making the wilderness to blossom as 
the rose ; and the same process has been going on, only 



JAPAN: HER VITAL PROBLEM 151 

less methodically, in Eastern Siberia. There are, of 
course, large tracts of country still untouched by the 
plough, but it can only be a matter of brief time before 
the tide of China's surplus millions flows over them all. 
Nothing but Exclusion Acts, forcibly applied, can ever 
stem that tide; the province of Shantung alone, with 
its population of 600 to the square mile, could probably 
fill up the whole of Eastern Mongolia in the lifetime 
of one generation. Against these thrifty pioneers even 
the best of Japanese farmers cannot hope to compete, 
and they know it. With anything like equal opportunity, 
the Chinese will always outwork them and under-live 
them. Japan may obtain political and administrative 
control of these undeveloped regions; profiting by the 
demoralisation of Russia, she can establish there her 
strategic and economic position; but the Chinese will 
surely inherit the land. As Russia discovered before 
19 10 in the Amur and maritime provinces of Siberia, 
no protective legislation can hold behind land frontiers 
the resistless tide of their advance, 

I believe that all these things have combined to lead 
the Japanese Government to modify its policy, not only 
in China, but in Manchuria and Mongolia, and that the 
idea of Eastern Asia as a wide field for Japanese emigration 
(which Marquis Komura proclaimed in the Diet ten years 
ago) has gradually come to be replaced by a policy of 
commercial and industrial expansion in those regions, 
which shall feed Japan's home industries in the same way 
as India feeds those of Great Britain. Such a policy, of 
course, does not solve — it merely defers — the problem of 
congestion on Japanese soil. It means that each year's 
growth of population must be absorbed into the nation's 
expanding industries, making Japan, like England, more 
and more dependent upon imported food supplies, more 
and more exposed, therefore, to the risks which such a 
condition entails. Looked at in this light, we perceive 
why Japanese Liberalism (as distinct from the Military 
Party) is doing all that it can to gain and retain the good- 



15^ CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

will of the Chinese, while at the same time losing no 
opportunity of extending its conquests by railway and 
bank, and fortifying its preferential rights against the 
claimants of the " open door." To commit any act of 
military aggression against China would be fatal, I think, 
to the fundamental object of Japan's present-day policy, 
which is, to secure raw materials for her factories on the 
most advantageous terms. The Foreign Minister, Viscount 
Uchida, put the matter very plainly when he said last 
year in the Diet, that " Japan is compelled to rely in 
a large measure upon the rich natural resources of China 
in order to assure her own economic existence." Her 
Liberal statesmen (men like Viscount Kato, Mr. Ozaki, 
and Baron Hayashi) believe that if China's goodwill 
and confidence can be secured, Japan can and should 
assist China to develop these resources, as she is doing in 
Manchuria and Korea, for the ultimate benefit of both 
countries and of international trade. 

It is not to be denied that during the past five years 
many of the steps which the Japanese Government has 
taken or sanctioned with a view to establishing her 
" special rights and interests " in China, constitute in 
effect a violation of the principle of the " open door." 
Viscount Ishii's negotiations with Mr. Lansing, like every 
utterance of every statesman in Japan when you come to 
the point, made it perfectly plain that Japan will never 
willingly consent to being debarred from emigration to 
America and at the same time forbidden to seek expansion 
in Asia. To conform to the conventions of diplomacy 
she may base her claim to those " special interests " 
on geographical propinquity, but one cannot study her 
history for the past thirty years, or examine her actual 
situation, without realising that it is based on imperative 
economic necessity. Above the clamour of the politicians, 
above the war cries of the Military Party, the far-seeing 
statesmen of Japan hear the voice of the people, that asks 
for bread and will not be denied. There has never been 
any swerving or inconsistency in the national policy since 



JAPAN: HER VITAL PROBLEM 153 

Japan first went to war with China in 1894, and the main- 
springs of that pohcy have been essentially economic. 
Realising the impossibility of expansion in the direction 
which they would have preferred — that is to say, on to 
the American continent — the rulers of Japan have 
concentrated every effort upon obtaining a firm foothold 
on the Asiatic mainland. And even though the path 
be fraught with danger, they must needs go forward, 
for they know that the nation's existence is at stake. 
Even before the war in Europe, when, in July 1910, she 
concluded her agreement with Russia, Japan had advanced, 
and Great Britain had admitted, her " rights and special 
interests " in Manchuria and Eastern Mongolia. The 
Government of the United States tacitly recognised those 
interests when it acquiesced in the Russo-Japanese veto 
on the construction of the railway from Chinchow to 
Aigun with American capital. Mr. Lansing's explanation 
of the phrase " special interests," as made before the 
Senate's Foreign Relations Committee in August 1919, 
leaves the matter much where it was. To " recognise 
that Japan, because of her geographical position, had a 
peculiar interest in China, but that it was not political 
in nature," was meaningless, for the simple reason that 
in China, where the foreigner enjoys extra-territorial 
rights, it is impossible to assert any kind of special interest 
that is not also in a sense political. Japan's latest 
reassertion of her special interests in Manchuria and Mon- 
golia will be discussed hereafter. The point which I 
now desire to emphasise is, that this claim is no new thing, 
but part and parcel of a perfectly natural and consistent 
policy, for the furtherance of which the nation has fought 
two great wars, and for which, if needs be, it will fight 
again. For the alternative, as they see it, is extinction. 
Setting aside the purely Japanese aspect of this problem, 
the question arises, what, as a matter of practical politics 
is the alternative to recognition of Japan's special interests 
in Manchuria and Mongolia, and to her development 
of the resources of this rich territory? That it cannot 



154 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

be satisfactorily developed by the Chinese Government, 
is evident; it is equally evident that, apart from its 
strategical value, this region is of vital importance to 
Japan as a new source of raw materials. The scientific 
development of this country, as I have shown, must be of 
immediate benefit to the Chinese population. There are, 
no doubt, political and sentimental reasons, based either 
on single-minded morality or enlightened self-interest, 
to justify objections to Japanese expansion in these 
regions, but the practical question remains, will the 
United States, or any other Power, assume a mandate 
to maintain China's shadowy sovereignty over her loosely- 
held dependencies? Let it not be forgotten that Mon- 
golia repudiated that sovereignty in 1913 and has only 
recently announced its desire to return to the fold; also 
that, as far back as 1901, Germany notified the world 
at large that the geographical term " China " could not 
be held to include Manchuria. Sooner or later, whatever 
happens, Japanese expansion on the Asiatic mainland 
will have to reckon with the Slav ; but in the meanwhile 
what can it profit the civilised world to oppose this expan- 
sion, so long as it takes the form of peaceful penetration 
in thinly-peopled regions? 

Ten years ago I ventured to forecast the development 
of this question, as follows : 

" For Canada and for Australia, as well as for America, 
the economic pressure of Japan involves problems of 
far-reaching importance, seriously affecting Imperial 
policies and the balance of power. A highly organised 
military nation, collectively amongst the most efficient 
on earth, demands more elbow-room and new markets; 
thus considered, the present course of Japanese policy 
clearly reflects the elementary truths of biological science. 
The Japanese are not a passive type of race, prepared 
to solve the problem of food supply by fatalist acceptance 
of famines, infanticide, and scourges of disease. They 
prefer, and are able, to expand at the expense of their 
weaker neighbours. If once we admit the inherent 
political and military inefficiency of China, the fate of 



JAPAN: HER VITAL PROBLEM 155 

Manchuria and Mongolia is sealed. Japan will not 
(indeed she cannot) consent to be excluded from those 
regions to gain which she resisted Russia's advance." 

If this was true ten years ago, Japan's need of elbow- 
room and new markets is much greater to-day. If, as I 
have endeavoured to show, the maintenance of China's 
sovereign rights and independence can best be secured 
by harmonious co-operation between the United States, 
England, and Japan, it follows, I think, that this aspect 
of the situation must be generally recognised. For what 
is the alternative ? To fight for the shadow of the " open 
door " in Manchuria, and meanwhile to allow China to 
go her self-determined way to irretrievable ruin ? The 
" open door " became a shadow in Manchuria when Japan 
took over the South Manchurian Railway from Russia 
as the price of victory, and the real problem which awaits 
solution by the civilised world to-day is, how to preserve 
China from complete dissolution, to re-establish and 
guarantee the absolute independence of her eighteen 
provinces under their own re-organised Government ? 
Without the loyal co-operation of Japan, the thing cannot 
be done ; but there would seem to be good grounds for 
hoping that this co-operation will be forthcoming, unless 
an arbitrary disregard of the fundamental facts of the 
situation should compel her to fight for her very existence. 



CHAPTER VIII 

japan's policy in china 

In the previous chapter I have endeavoured to show, 
firstly, that the motive force behind Japan's imperative 
claims to expansion is severe economic pressure, due 
to increasing over-population of the Island Kingdom; 
secondly, that this pressure is compelled to seek relief 
on the Asiatic continent, because insistence on a free right 
of entry into America and Australia is impracticable; 
thirdly, because it is evident that, as labourers, colonists, 
and farmers, the Japanese cannot hope to compete with 
the Chinese in Manchuria and Mongolia, the Japanese 
Government's policy of expansion now aims chiefly at 
obtaining control of the latent resources of these regions, 
and developing them as economic protectorates, so to 
speak, for the supply of raw materials. I have also 
endeavoured to show that, if China is to be protected 
from internal disintegration, a common purpose of good 
will towards her must actuate the United States, Great 
Britain, and Japan ; that this cannot possibly be achieved 
if Japan has reason to consider that her claims to expan- 
sion are being arbitrarily thwarted by the same Powers 
which deny her the rights of emigration to white men's 
countries ; and that therefore it would seem to be good 
statesmanship to recognise Japan's " special interests " 
in Manchuria and Mongoha. Such recognition, of course, 
would have to form part of a general settlement of the 
Far Eastern question, the main purpose of which would 
be to reaffirm, and guarantee beyond all risk of further 
violation, the fundamental object of the Anglo-Japanese 
Alhance, namely : 

156 



JAPAN'S POLICY IN CHINA 157 

" The preservation of the common interests of all 
Powers in China, by ensuring the independence and 
integrity of the Chinese Empire and the principle of 
equal opportunities for the commerce and industry of 
all nations in China." 

As far back as 1913, in connection with the old Con- 
sortium's reorganisation " loan negotiations," the Russian 
and Japanese Governments filed their claims to respective 
" special rights and interests " in Manchuria and Mon- 
goUa. Russia, for the time being, has left the stage; 
but Japan, in forming the new Consortium initiated by 
the United States Government, has reasserted (though 
in a modified form) her separate claim. The Japanese 
base their claim in this matter upon strategical and also 
upon economic grounds. Discussing the matter with 
one of the Under-Secretaries of the Foreign Office at 
Tokyo, I was informed that " Japan's claim, prompted 
as it is by the special relations in which she stands with 
Manchuria and Mongolia, is only the demand for a 
reservation, whereby certain enterprises vital to her 
existence and self-defence could, if required by the force 
of circumstances, be excluded from the scope of the 
Consortium." Viscount Uchida, the Foreign Minister, 
and other statesmen whose views on the subject have 
been made public, are generally content to base their 
objections to international enterprises in these regions 
on the ground of their " territorial propinquity " to 
Japan. They also point out that the present dangerous 
position of affairs in Siberia, abandoned by the Allies, 
makes it more necessary than ever for Japan to protect 
her national interests. But, stripped of all diplomatic 
verbiage, the simple fact emerges that Japan won her 
" special interests " in Manchuria at the cost of a long 
and costly war with Russia, and that, had she not done 
this, these provinces would long since have been Russian. 
As far back as 1907, when she vetoed British and American 
railway concessions granted by the Chinese Government 
in Manchuria, she gave an unmistakable indication of 



158 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KORE^ 

the policy which she has since consistently pursued, so 
that the Consortium reservation is no new thing. 

Inasmuch as the nature of Japan's " special rights and 
interests " has never been definitely submitted to, or 
recognised in detail by, the Governments concerned, and 
because, while claiming special rights and interests, 
Japan has always been at pains to assert that they involve 
no economic monopolies and will not violate the principle 
of the " open door," they should provide scope for negotia- 
tion and a basis for revision of the whole situation in the 
Far East. That revision should entail not only a settle- 
ment of the Shantung question, with full recognition of 
China's unimpaired sovereignty throughout the entire 
province, but the abolition of all " special interests " in 
China proper which infringe or diminish that sovereignty. 
Assuming that Japan is really prepared to act in concert 
with Great Britain and America, and in the best interests 
of China, recognition of her privileged position in Man- 
churia and Mongolia should be balanced by her consent 
to a new deal and a square deal all round. The civiUsed 
world might acquiesce with a clear conscience in Japanese 
economic expansion into the undeveloped and loosely- 
held dependencies north of the Great Wall, but if there 
be any truth in all our profession of noble ideals, any 
real sympathy for the misfortunes of the Chinese nation, 
the Powers must agree, once and for all, to call a halt 
to further exploitation of this defenceless people. For 
MongoUa is, so to speak, an empty house, and Manchuria 
a house with rooms to let ; but China's house is her own, 
and its many mansions are crowded; there is no room 
in them for hungry strangers. 

If one were justified in gauging the future development 
of the situation by the light of the Japanese Govern- 
ment's recent declarations of its policy towards China, 
such an agreement as I have outlined above would appear 
to be not only feasible, but to the obvious advantage of 
all concerned, since only by some such understanding 
can China's resources be peacefully and rapidly developed 



JAPAN'S POLICY IN CHINA 159 

for the common benefit of the world's trade. Looking 
back over the past three years, we find a remarkable 
family likeness in all the pronouncements by Japan's 
Foreign Ministers in regard to China. At the close of 
1916, the policy publicly announced by Count Terauchi 
and his Cabinet was founded on a self-denying resolution 
to allow China henceforward to manage her own affairs 
without interference; to co-operate with China for the 
preservation of peace in the Orient ; and not to seek to 
acquire any further " rights and special interests " in 
China. Since then many similar declarations have been 
recorded. For example, Viscount Uchida, the present 
Foreign Minister, announced in January 1919, " in view 
of mischievous rumours that had been circulated," that 
Japan had no territorial ambitions in China, as elsewhere ; 
neither did she contemplate any action which might 
militate against the development of the legitimate 
interest and welfare of the Chinese nation. Again, at 
last year's opening of the Diet, the same Minister an- 
nounced that it was contrary to the desires of the Japanese 
Government that " civil strife should be protected in 
China for years. It was really in the hope of facilitating 
the reconciliation of the North and South that we have 
taken so much pains in the control of loans, as well as in 
the restrictions of the export of arms to China. In short, 
we are most anxious to see an early completion of the 
work of unification in China." 

So far, so good. Japan's declared policy towards 
China is, on the face of it, calculated to facilitate the 
concerted action required to restore good government 
in that country. Unfortunately, however, it still remains __ --^ 
true that Japan's foreign policy is not in the hands of y^ <^lr -, 
her Foreign Minister, or, for that matter, in the hands^^ | ^2^''^^^^'^^^ 
of the Cabinet. And it is also incontrovertibly true that, ^v^ /yf^ 
during the past six years, while England was fighting for rl^' &j*^^^ 
her national existence, the invisible Powers behind the -/yv^ '^ar^ 
Throne, which actually control Japanese policy, have ' v 
done many things in China which are not only flagrantly 



160 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

opposed to the public declarations of the Government, 
but are in direct violation of the spirit and the letter 
of the Anglo- Japanese Alliance. Making all due allow- 
ance for Japan's economic difficulties, and for her natural 
desire to take every advantage of the opportunities 
created by the war to establish herself in a preferential 
position in China; making allowance also for the indis- 
putable fact that the arbitrary demands which she 
forced upon China in May 1915 were chiefly inspired by 
the conviction that Germany would win the war— -it 
still remains impossible to reconcile her actual and present 
proceedings in China with her public professions of good 
will toward that country and her avowed respect for the 
principle of the " open door," 

Let us consider, in the first instance, the public utter- 
ances of Viscount Uchida, above quoted, and compare 
them with the actual facts of the situation. The Foreign 
Minister declares it to be the policy of his Government 
" to facilitate the reconciliation of the North and the 
South," and to " assist in the work of unification in 
China." But he knows — indeed, the whole world knows — 
that the chief cause of quarrel between the political faction 
which calls itself the South, and the party in power at 
Peking, lies in the secret agreements which the latter has 
been compelled or persuaded to make with the repre- 
sentatives of the Japanese General Staff, the irresponsible 
but real controllers of Japan's foreign policy. He knows 
that the Military Agreement of March 1918, in particular, 
has aroused something more than partisan hostility in 
China, that all the best elements in the country resent 
and fear the dominating influence which Japan has 
thereby acquired over the corrupt politicians of the 
" Northern " party. As to " the pains which Japan has 
taken in the control of loans and export of arms to 
China," there has undoubtedly been a certain slackening 
of activity of late on the part of Japanese official and 
semi-official money-lenders, which may possibly be 
attributed to the levival of the Consortium, but is more 



JAPAN'S POLICY IN CHINA 161 

probably due to the fact that every reliable security has 
now been pledged. Some thirty secret loan agreements 
were made by Japanese agents at Peking and in the 
provinces during 1918, the security usually being some 
railway, mine or industrial concern, possession of which 
is calculated to promote Japanese control of raw materials 
at their source. The total amount of these loans 
exceeds 200,000,000 yen. That these equivocal activities 
represent a definite policy is clearly indicated by the 
rewards and decorations which the . Japanese Govern- 
ment has bestowed upon officials of the Finance Depart- 
ment " for services rendered in connection with loans to 
China," and to military officers " upon the conclusion of 
the Sino- Japanese Mihtary Agreement." 

It is unnecessary to labour the point. It is undeniable 
that, next to the disorganisation of China, the most 
important factor in the Far Eastern problem lies in the 
hidden hand of the Mihtary Party at Tokyo. As it was 
thirty years ago, so it is to-day — Japan's pohcy in foreign 
affairs is directed not by the Foreign Office, but by the 
War Office. The voice is the voice of Uchida, but the 
hand is the unseen hand of Yamagata. Therefore, in 
considering the possibihty of a new deal and a square 
deal in the Far East, one is always confronted by the 
question : Is the power of the Mihtary Party really 
waning (as every one in Japan assures you it is), and 
will it be replaced by real Cabinet government in time 
to allow of satisfactory co-operation between the great 
commercial nations ? I have discussed this question 
with leading men of all parties in Japan, from the Prime 
Minister downwards — with politicians, business men, and 
journalists — and everywhere I find them expressing the 
same opinion, namely, that the liberal and concihatory 
pohcy proclaimed in the Government's public utter- 
ances will surely triumph over the Imperiahst and 
aggressive pohcy of the Mihtary Party, and that before 
long representative government will replace the domina- 
tion of the Satsuma-Choshiu Clans. Nevertheless, it 

M 



162 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

remains true that Japan's policy in China is still domi- 
nated by the military staff, and this fact makes it im- 
possible to regard the declarations of her Foreign Ministers 
as more than pious aspirations. One of the best books 
that has been written on this situation in the Orient 
since the war, Mr. Frederick Coleman's Unveiling of the 
Far East, shows that in 1916 Japanese statesmen spoke 
of the waning influence of the miUtary party just as 
confidently as they do to-day, and professed the same 
faith in the triumph of a liberal policy of fair competition 
or friendly co-operation in China. But the fact remains 
that the aggressive and unjustifiable pohcy of the " twenty- 
one demands " of May 1915 is still in force, that the 
secret Sino- Japanese Mihtary Agreement of March 1918 
has aggravated the situation thereby created, and that 
neither pubhc opinion as voiced in the Press, nor the 
responsible government of Japan, gives any indication 
of a determination to put an end to this anomalous state 
of affairs. Yet end it must, if there is to be any renewal 
of the Anglo- Japanese AUiance and any hope of peace 
in the Orient. 

On March i, 1920, I had an opportunity of dis- 
cussing these matters with Viscount Kato, who was 
Foreign Minister at the time the famous " Twenty-One 
Demands " were formulated. He took occasion to observe 
that the fifth group of those demands (subsequently 
withdrawn) was never meant to be anything more than 
an expression of the Japanese Government's hopes and 
wishes. Without contesting this somewhat dehcate 
question, or referring to the still more dehcate point that 
President Yuan Shih-k'ai had been bound over to keep 
these hopes and wishes secret, I pointed out that, accord- 
ing to common report in Peking, the present secret 
Mihtary Agreement confers on the Japanese mihtary 
party, its heirs and assigns, rights and special interests 
very similar in effect to the " hopes " abandoned with 
Group V of this secret agreement. Viscount Kato, like 
every one else in Japan, professed ignorance ; but, looking 



JAPAN'S POLICY IN CHINA 163 

at the matter from the point of view required by the 
Anglo- Japanese Alliance, he was bound to confess that 
the agreement would either have to be terminated before 
long or its terms made public. 

This so-called MiUtary Agreement was, in effect, nothing 
more than a financial deal, by virtue of which Tuan 
Chi-jui and his friends kept themselves in power and 
funds, by the aid of Japanese loans. Two months after 
it was made, the Chinese Government, to allay the sus- 
picions which it had aroused, published a statement to 
the effect that it was intended to provide for joint military 
action against German and Bolshevik movements in the 
Siberian borders. " The scheme," said this statement, 
" has no reference to any other matters, and will lapse 
with the conclusion of the war. The agreement will 
not actually become operative unless enemy influences 
actually penetrate Siberia. It is not a Treaty, but an 
understanding, which becomes null and void if there is 
no danger of enemy invasion. The only reason for 
non-publication of its terms is to prevent their coming 
to the knowledge of the enemy. The convention involves 
no loss of territorial sovereign rights and confers no 
privileges on Japan." An official statement was pub- 
lished by the Japanese Government on June 8 to the 
same effect. 

But what are the facts to-day, when the war has been 
over for more than two years and the Alhes have with- 
drawn from Siberia ? It is evident that the avowed object 
of the agreement has ceased to exist and that there can 
be no further justification for concealing its terms, quite 
apart from the provisions that, by the terms of the Anglo- 
Japanese Agreement, Great Britain is entitled to know 
them. But according to Tang Shao-yi, and others who 
are in a position to know the facts, the Agreement will 
not lapse, because it was secretly renewed by exchange 
of letters in the spring of 1919. The 420 Japanese 
military officers attached to the Chinese forces in Chihli 
and Fengtien will not fold up their tents Hke the Arab — 



164 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

at least, not just yet. The Sino- Japanese Military Agree- 
ment, with all that it entails, will remain vahd and 
binding upon China as long as the General Staff at Tokyo 
desires it. ^ 

Several sincerely liberal-minded public men in Japan 
(such as Mr. Ozaki of the Kenseikai party) assured me 
that all these sad, bad things are rapidly passing away, 
and that, even if the Government cannot yet control 
the unfortunate proceedings of the General Staff, there 
is every reason to hope and believe that the Military 
Party itself is beginning to realise the error of its ways. 
Its policy, they say, may be expected to conform in the 
near future to the public declarations of the Government. 
Is not General Tanaka, the Minister for War, a very 
reasonable man, and has not the Prime Minister proved 
the growing influences of Liberalism by stopping the sale 
of arms to China, and by substituting civilian for mihtary 
authority in Korea and the Liaotung peninsula? If 
only the world will be patient, all will be well. It may be 
so, but, as I have said, the best men in Japan, men like 
Baron Hayashi and Baron Ishii, were saying precisely 
the same thing four years ago ; and the sands are running 
out. I believe that the influence of the Chauvinists and 
the Jingoes is waning, but that the process may prove 
to be too slow to be of much practical benefit in the 
present critical stage of the Far Eastern question. There is, 
no doubt, much truth in the opinion, frequently expressed 
to me in conversation by bankers and other business 
men, that the process might be materially accelerated 
were there any indication of a definite " China policy " 
either in England or the United States. 

Meanwhile, there are signs and to spare that the 
mihtarists are not without honour in their own country, 
aye, even among those who profess to deplore their 
irresponsible activities in China. One of the most 
significant of these straws on the political wind is the 
Asian Review, a journal of which the first number appeared 
with a great flourish of trumpets in February 1920. It 



JAPAN'S POLICY IN CHINA 165 

is edited by Mr. Ryohei Uchida, the notorious ronin 
leader of the Black Dragon Society, and as a literary 
production calls for little notice. But its appearance . 
on the scene at this juncture, with a published list of 
supporters which includes most of the leading men in 
the Government and the Press, cannot be ignored. For 
Mr. Ryohei Uchida and the Black Dragon Society have 
been too frequently employed by the military party as 
agents provocateurs, and have rendered too many valuable 
services in that capacity, to be lightly set aside. Now 
the attitude of the review is one of truculent chauvinism, 
of impartial hostility to Great Britain, the United States, 
or any other country which may attempt to thwart the 
Pan- Asian dream, with Japan as undisputed ruler of the 
East. Mr. Uchida's views on the subject of " Asia for 
the Asiatics," as set forth in an inaugural article, are 
childishly crude, but the article contains certain interest- 
ing admissions concerning the activities of the Black 
Dragon Society in China, which should prove embarrass- 
ing to some of his official supporters. Mr. Uchida con- 
fesses, for instance, that before the war with China, he 
and his friends, as an organised association, were the 
first to " extend aid to the Korean people, who had been 
struggling hard to throw off the shackles of Chinese 
interference." Again in 1911, " when a revolution broke 
out in China, we organised an association and gave 
assistance to the Chinese revolutionaries." The fact 
has long been notorious that the Black Dragon Society 
and others (with the tacit approval of the Japanese 
Government) have for years been fomenting rebellion 
in the South, whilst the Japanese Government itself has 
been lending money to the North on the security of 
valuable concessions. The Foreign Minister's recent 
. assurance, that it is the earnest wish of his Government 
to " facihtate the reconciUation of the North and the 
South" gains nothing in weight from the pubUcation of 
his own name and those of most of his colleagues as 
supporters of a publicist who boasts that he has done 



166 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

his best to prevent that reconciliation. The Asian 
Review's first Hst of supporters included not only the 
Premier, the Minister for War, and most of the Cabinet, 
but practically all the permanent officials of the Foreign 
Office, from Viscount Uchida downwards. Within the 
first few days after this journal's first appearance, I had 
occasion to discuss the matter with several of these 
officials. I talked, for instance, with Mr. Hanihara, 
Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs, and with Mr. Yoshizawa, 
Director of the Bureau of Political Affairs ; with Viscount 
Kato, Marquis Komura, and Mr. Tokonami, Minister of 
Home Affairs, and, after them, with a number of bankers, 
business men, and Members of Parhament. Amongst 
these officials I found none who could see anjrthing 
improper in the public association of their names with 
a propaganda which is frankly anti-British and provoca- 
tive. All professed to regard Mr. Ryohei Uchida as a 
harmless fanatic, a ronin in political journahsm, who 
must be allowed to let off steam, but whose influence was 
absolutely nil. They could not, or would not, see that 
if this man possesses influence enough to have his review 
god-fathered by the Premier and the Minister of War, 
and to include in his first number articles by Marquis 
Okuma, Baron Shibusawa, and Dr. Soyeda, public opinion 
abroad may be forgiven for not regarding him as an 
irresponsible person. 

I have referred to this question of the Asian Review 
at some length because the association, however indirect, 
of any member of the Government with the fire-eating 
leader of the Black Dragons must remain open to serious 
misconstruction, so long as Japan's pohcy in China 
continues to express itself in secret agreements based on 
the lines of the " Twenty-One Demands." For it is 
beyond dispute that the policy represented by those 
" Demands " and by the subsequent " Mihtary Agree- 
ments " is practically identical with the policy which 
Ryohei Uchida and his friends have consistently advo- 
cated. Take, for instance, the Black Dragon chief's 



I 



JAPAN'S POLICY IN CHINA 167 

" programme for the solution of the Chinese question," 
as pubhshed several years ago in a pamphlet issued for 
private circulation : 

" Two points are most important in connection with 
the solution of this question : (i) to cause the sovereignty 
over South Manchuria and Eastern Mongolia to be 
entirely transferred to Japan, and (2) to hold the power 
of supervision and direction over China's finances. 

" South Manchuria and Eastern Mongolia, under the 
sovereignty of the Imperial Government, should be 
made the base from which to control China proper. As 
to China proper, we should at first hold the real power 
of direction and make the control of its foreign policy 
and the management of its affairs (internal, financial, 
and military) our goal. To take all these matters into 
our hands at once would create anxiety in the world, 
but the acquisition of the sovereignty over the two 
regions mentioned and of the power of direction would 
enable us to extend our influence and finally to attain our 
goal. 

" After the acquisition of the power to supervise 
China's finances, we must decrease her Army and arma- 
ments. In case of trouble arising from the disbandment 
of troops, Japan would be responsible for the dispatch 
of a force to suppress it. In that case, she would obtain 
the power of training the Chinese Army and of inter- 
fering with the internal administration through the 
control of revenue." 

Now the reader who has followed me thus far will 
remember that the rulers of Japan consider that the 
country's economic situation justifies their claim to 
expansion into the thinly-peopled regions to the north 
of the Great Wall, and that this claim is moreover war- 
ranted by the fact that Japan drove Russia from these 
regions at great cost of blood and treasure. I have 
suggested that no satisfactory settlement of the Far 
Eastern question is possible without some recognition 
of this claim, which no Japanese Government would 
dare to abandon. But inasmuch as the preservation of 
China's independence and the strict maintenance of the 



168 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

" open door " are the only objects of British poHcy — ^to 
say nothing of the other nations concerned — ^it is evident 
that the Powers behind the Consortium must refuse to 
recognise Japan's claims in this direction so long as 
there is any possibility of Manchuria and Mongolia 
being used as a base for further aggression upon China 
proper. Therefore, so long as the activities of the Military 
Party continue to justify the suspicions which they have 
aroused since 1915, so long as the general tendency of 
those activities proceeds along the lines advocated by 
Mr. Ryohei Uchida and his fellow- Jingoes, it is useless 
for either the Intellectuals or the Liberals to proclaim 
their good intentions towards China and their good 
faith towards England. We must give these men credit 
for sense enough to know that Great Britain is not likely 
to renew the Alliance under conditions which would 
threaten the extinction of her trade with China. We 
must also beheve that these men are sincere, when they 
say that the great bulk of public opinion in Japan depre- 
cates the proceedings of the Mihtary Party and would 
like to see China helped by the united action of the 
friendly Powers to become a strong nation and a rich 
market. But it remains for Japan to give assurances 
that the declared policy of the Government will hence- 
forth be binding upon the Mihtary Party, as well as upon 
its civil exponents. 

Close examination of the arguments put forth during 
the last few years by the diplomatic spokesmen of Japan 
(particularly by Marquis Saionji and Marquis Ishii) shows 
that, stripped of all verbiage, they amount to claiming 
a privileged position not only in Manchuria, but in 
China, on grounds of territorial propinquity, community 
of race, etc. On these grounds, Burma, Siam, and Thibet 
might claim similar advantages with greater force. The 
truth of the matter, of course, is that Japan's national 
existence is going to depend more and more upon her 
being able to secure from China and her dependencies 
the supplies of steel, iron, and other raw materials which 



JAPAN'S POLICY IN CHINA 169 

she needs for her industries. Like Great Britain, though 
in a lesser degree, she has to face the problem of feeding 
her surplus milHons by the profits of those industries, 
under ever-increasing competition. Therefore, all her 
efforts since the war with Russia have been continually 
directed to making for herself in China such a position 
of economic advantage as shall protect her hereafter 
from that competition to the utmost extent possible. 
The activities of the Military Party at Peking have only 
been one means to that end; those of her diplomatic 
agents, financiers, and merchants have all contributed 
to the same. But all with one accord continue to pay 
lip service to the principle of the " open door " because, 
since the war, the Anglo- Japanese AUiance has again 
become a desirable asset and an insurance pohcy. From 
the Anglo-American point of view, therefore, there should 
be leverage and to spare in the renewal of that Alliance, 
and it should be possible thereby to induce Japan to 
abandon those pohcies and proceedings which since 1915 
have violated it both in the spirit and the letter. 

Most Japanese, when cornered in argument, will confess 
that they did those things because, in 1915 and 1916, 
it seemed to them that Germany was not going to be 
decisively beaten, and that they were therefore justified 
in pegging out their new claims on the assumption of 
a stalemate between the exhausted European Powers. 
Cynical, if you like, and yet natural enough from the 
Oriental point of view. But from the same point of 
view it is only natural for Great Britain to insist upon 
a return in the direction of the status quo ante. 

Without attempting to suggest the scope and effect 
of such a new deal, I think it is evident that, to be 
of any real benefit to China, it should involve the com- 
plete abohtion of all " spheres of influence," Shantung 
included; the unification of all railway concessions in 
China proper, under one Chinese Board, with the necessary 
foreign financial control ; and the cancellation of all the 
vague claims, advisorships, and petty encroachments on 



170 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

China's sovereignty, which have grown out of leased 
territories and concessions and railway rights. It is not 
seemly that the Powers should continue solemnly to 
assure each other of their unswerving determination to 
uphold the sovereignty of China whilst every day witnesses 
the unprotesting acceptance of fresh encroachments upon 
that sovereignty. No nation is blameless in this matter ; 
even the United States has its extra-territorialised post 
offices, which compete with, and at the present moment 
underbid, the Chinese Postal Service. But, in pursuance 
of the policy of the " Twenty-One Demands," Japan has 
arrogated to herself rights, powers, and special interests 
for which there can be no possible justification. It is 
not enough that at Peking her mihtary and other agents 
swarm in such numbers as to convey the idea of a Pro- 
tectorate; that her wireless service from the capital 
communicates directly with Japan, and that she has even 
introduced Imperial Japanese pillar-boxes and postmen 
in every district of the capital ; all over China since 1915 
her proceedings have been those of a creditor infringing 
on the rights of a defenceless debtor. 

Of the Shantung question it is not necessary to say 
much. Japan does not need Kiaochao as a miniature 
naval base (the General Staff advised against it in 1915), 
and the Imperialists' attempt to have the place made 
into a colony under a Mihtary Governor was defeated 
upon the advice of Baron Hayashi. It is therefore to 
be expected that in due course Japan will withdraw her 
troops from the Shantung railway and the Kiaochao 
district and restore Tsingtao to the Chinese authorities. 
But, except for the matter of Customs revenues and the 
preservation of China's much-injured " face," the restora- 
tion, as a Chinese writer puts it, will simply amount to 
handing back the shell after eating the oyster. Even if 
President Wilson at the Versailles Conference had not 
conferred upon Japan by treaty her rights of succession 
to Germany's property in China, and even if the Japanese 
Government now fulfils its solemn pledge not to deprive 



JAPAN'S POLICY IN CHINA 171 

China of anything which she possessed before the war, 
nothing can alter the fact that the town and harbour of 
Tsingtaohave been converted since 1915 into an entrenched 
and evidently permanent outpost for Japanese trade. 
And this has been done not only with complete dis- 
regard of most of the conditions under which Germany 
held the leased territory from the Chinese, but in viola- 
tion of the principle of equal opportunity where other 
nations are concerned. 

Their desire to make hay while the sun shone was 
natural enough, but the methods by which the Japanese 
have achieved their end at Kiaochao have not been of a 
nature to endear them either to the Chinese or to other 
nations. For instance, in laying out the new Japanese 
town which has replaced the German colony at Tsingtao, 
a place had to be set apart for the local Yoshiwara, the 
" red-light section," without which no Japanese settle- 
ment is ever complete. The site chosen was a large one, 
and on it several blocks of buildings have been erected 
surrounded by neat gardens, all in the best Japanese 
manner. Unfortunately, those who selected the spot 
overlooked the fact that it adjoins the residences and 
schools of the Presbyterian Mission. This is, no doubt, 
one of the cases which that prolific apologist, Mr. Kawa- 
kami, would include in his list of " unfortunate blunders " ; 
and he might add that it took place five years ago. But 
there are other and much more recent cases. Early in 
1920 there were several ex-German properties to be 
disposed of by public auction at Tsingtao, for some of 
which the agents of three or four well-known British 
firms had been instructed to bid. On a certain Tuesday 
the Japanese authorities gave notice that the auction 
would take place on the following Friday, but that only 
registered estate agents would be allowed to bid. As 
this class consisted entirely of Japanese, the results of 
the auction would have been a foregone conclusion had 
it taken place. But the Foreign Office in London spoke 
the word in season and Tokyo cancelled the arrangements. 



172 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

One meets with many honest gentlemen in Japan who 
inquire why it is that their countrymen have become so 
generally dishked abroad in recent years. Incidents of 
the kind above described suggest one answer to that 
question. They suggest also the reflection that Tokyo 
can, if it will, prevent many of these things, and that 
the establishment of a good understanding between the 
Powers must hereafter depend to a very great extent 
upon the class of agents that Japan employs in China 
and the orders upon which they proceed. 

England, in particular, has reason to complain of 
her Allies' activities in China during the past five years. 
I need not dwell on the violent anti-British Press campaign 
which broke out and swept through Japan, with scarcely 
a protesting voice, in 1916, when Germany's star appeared 
to be in the ascendant. It was not what we had a right 
to expect from a nation that prides itself on chivalry, 
but the Japanese would wish that unfortunate episode 
to be forgotten ; let bygones be bygones. Their feverish 
hay-making in China, however, and especially in the 
Yangtsze Valley, at the time when Great Britain was 
not in a position to protect her interests, could hardly 
help leaving a distinctly disagreeable impression. Their 
activities in the matter of loans to the provincial authori- 
ties, and of railway and mining concessions in the Yangtsze 
provinces, have all been conducted without the sHghtest 
regard for Great Britain's prior claims to a particular 
interest in the development of this region. They may 
say, no doubt, that Great Britain's claim to a sphere of 
interest had been allowed to lapse in 1900 and again in 
igog, after having been successfully contested by the 
Germans ; but this line of argument overlooks the moral 
obligations incumbent upon a loyal Ally. When, for 
example, in January 1915, the Japanese Government 
instructed its Minister at Peking to include under Group 
III of the " Twenty-One Demands " recognition of 
Japan's claims to priority of rights in the Hanyehping 
Coal and Iron Company, with an extensive mining 



JAPAN'S POLICY IN CHINA 173 

monopoly attached thereto, it was not " playing the 
game. " It was a direct attack upon the principle of equal 
industrial opportunity at a point where England was 
fully entitled to expect fair play. The Ally, whose claims 
we have recognised to veto all but Japanese railway 
concessions in Manchuria, and who now claims the rever- 
sion of Germany's exclusive privileges in Shantung, 
should have been the last to assert her determination to 
estabhsh herself at the heart of the Yangtsze Valley by 
means of concessions privily obtained by loans to hungry 
Chinese officials. Japan now keeps a small garrison at 
Hankow, intended, no doubt, to emphasise the principle 
of the " open door." Her agents are also working con- 
tinually, and by methods which will seldom bear inspec- 
tion, to increase Japanese pohtical influence at Shanghai. 
If Japan's urgent need is trade, if she must at all costs 
find and develop new markets, the same holds good of 
Great Britain. Japan has all the advantage of geo- 
graphical propinquity ; to seek further and unfair advan- 
tage at her Allies' expense is surely bad policy; and 
many fair-minded men in Japan recognise the fact, 

A good many business men with whom I had occasion 
to discuss these matters, frankly admitted that so long as 
Mr. Obata continues to be Minister at Peking it may 
reasonably be assumed that Japanese policy in China will 
continue to be framed in the spirit of the " Twenty-One 
Demands," and distinguished, moreover, by an unpleasant 
combination of slimness and aggressiveness. From per- 
sonal observation I can vouch for it that if the Japanese 
Government wishes to avoid increasingly cordial re- 
lations with China, they have got the right man in 
Mr. Minister Obata at Peking. Those who believe that 
the policy of friendhness and fair deahng is destined 
before long to triumph over the Military Party and its 
preference for ways that are dark, beheve also that Mr. 
Obata will soon be translated. There have been rumours 
lately in Tokyo that Mr. Minister Ijuin is likely to resume 
his old post at Peking, and that important changes will 



174 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

be made at the Foreign Office. Should these changes 
occur, they will go far to justify fair hopes of a settlement 
of the Far Eastern question on a basis of good under- 
standing and good will. 

It is evident that the present position of affairs, especially 
as regards the Shantung question (not to speak of secret 
agreements), cannot continue indefinitely. Sooner or 
later there must be an International Conference of the 
Powers chiefly concerned for the settlement of these 
questions. In September 1916, the State Department 
at Washington let it be known that it would take up 
these and other questions " with all the world Powers 
actually or tacitly committed to the ' open door ' policy." 
But experience of international affairs in China has 
generally proved that where the Powers concerned are 
numerous, conferences are unprofitable and unpractical, 
and that they lead chiefly to the exhibition of inter- 
national jealousy, from which the mandarins issue dis- 
creetly triumphant. It would therefore seem most 
desirable that without further delay Great Britain should 
communicate fully and frankly, as the Treaty of Alliance 
prescribes, and make proposals to Japan for regularising 
the entire situation. But two conditions must be essential 
preUminaries to any general negotiation : first, that 
Japan should be willing to co-operate loyally in such 
measures as may be proposed for the financial recon- 
struction of China; second, that the Military Party in 
Japan should cease from carrying out an independent 
policy, which conflicts with the Japanese Government's 
public assurances and undertakings. 

Many competent observers of Oriental affairs consider 
that this second condition is not likely to be attained 
until Marshal Prince Yamagata shall have passed from 
the scene. Time will show. Personally, I believe that 
the moment is opportune for this vital change, and that 
the strength of Liberahsm in Japan should be sufficient 
to achieve it, if convinced of the sympathy and confidence 
of pubhc opinion in Great Britain and the United States. 



JAPAN'S POLICY IN CHINA 175 

Premier Hara and the Seiyukai Party behind him would, 
I believe, welcome an Anglo-American- Japanese entente 
and a common reconstructive policy in China — ^indeed, 
they have publicly advocated it. For they, like our- 
selves, have one principal object in view, which is trade, 
and ever more trade, in China; and the events of the 
last few years have convinced many of them that the 
MiUtary Party's methods are not calculated to advance 
that object. And even those who hold that a continuance 
of chaos in China would be profitable to Japan, are begin- 
ning to realise that such profit would be very dearly 
purchased at the price of national isolation. 



CHAPTER IX 

THE JAPAN OF TO-DAY 

In China, despite the parlous state of poUtics and the 
fictitious clamour of the students, one feels, as of old, 
that the established order, the structural life of the people, 
rests upon solid foundations of ancient and venerable 
tradition. Perils of change there are, of course, actions 
and reactions ; but most of them are external, imposed 
by the invading aUen, and therefore of their nature, 
impermanent. They are but wind-driven breakers, roar- 
ing on the rocks : beyond them, " unsailed by ship of 
yours, stretch to the blue horizon the silent spaces of the 
sea," the tranquil, brooding soul of a nation whose philo- 
sophy has stood the test of ages. So far as the mind of 
the Chinese people is concerned, our five years of devastat- 
ing war might have been fought on another planet : its 
causes and results concern them no more than the rumble 
of a distant drum. 

In Japan (revisited for the first time after ten years) I 
found myself wondering, as of old, at that quality in 
the average European resident which " cannot see the 
wood because of the trees." Just as the student clamour 
in China tends to confuse the historical sense and political 
perspective of the Treaty Port inhabitants, so in Japan, 
observers on the spot seem to be so impressed by the 
growth of political ferment and labour unrest, that they 
are liable to lose sight of the inherent vitality and cohesive 
value of the family system, on which the whole structure 
of Japan's society is based. A great strain is being brought 
to bear upon Japan's social structure by reason of her 
rapid transition into industrialism, of her newly-acquired 
wealth, and the effect of Western pohtical ideas upon the 

176 



THE JAPAN OF TO-DAY 177 

masses since the war. Of this there is no doubt ; but 
those who judge by the more uncivil and unruly elements 
of Japanese life with which, alas, one meets at the sea 
ports, and come thus to darkly pessimistic conclusions, 
are inclined to overlook the protective force of the family 
system. It constitutes, beyond all doubt, the strongest 
moral and political force in Japan ; so deep in the past lie 
its roots, so strong are its inherited impulses of obedience 
and loyalty, that I cannot bring myself to believe that 
Western civilisation will ever dominate or destroy it. 
Beyond the voices of the politicians and the turmoil of 
the Press, I see, with the eye of faith, " these that dig and 
weave, that plant and build ; men whose deeds are good, 
though their words may be few; men whose lives are 
worthy of honour, be they never so humble," and I 
remember gratefully that there are as yet only about two 
miUion Japanese in factories, while more than half the 
population are living and working on the land. 

Nevertheless, there is a sense of increasing tension, of 
contagious unrest, in Japan, which has no counterpart in 
China, and which is giving food for anxious thought to the 
nation's leaders. It is essentially a town-bred disease, 
but it is serious for all that, now that Tokyo has grown to 
be a city of three million inhabitants, and popular educa- 
tion and railways have brought the newspapers into the 
country districts. It is an unrest both social and poUtical, 
and its origin may be ascribed in large measure to the war, 
which, as I have shown, has increased the cost of living 
for the masses, while it has brought enormous fortunes 
to a small class of privileged traders and profiteers. 

Long ago, Lafcadio Hearn, in Japan : An Interpreta- 
tion, predicted that the country of his adoption would 
incur its greatest perils if, as he feared, spiritual decay 
should follow in the wake of sordid commercialism. He, 
who sincerely admired the Japanese, who loved the dignity 
and wisdom of the " Way of the Gods," described the 
effect of the West's modern materialism upon the ancient 
virtues of loyalty and courage and simple faith ; and 

N 



178 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

many of Japan's wisest and best leaders have realised this 
danger, and have striven, as far as possible, gradually to 
adapt the material and political devices of the West to 
the existing social structure, to assimilate and utilise our 
many inventions without loss of national individuahty 
and virtue. From the outset of Japan's relations with 
the outside world it has been the fixed policy of her older 
statesmen, beginning with Ito and Inouye, to build the 
new edifice of State upon the old foundations. Their 
determination to permit no violent break with the past 
undoubtedly saved the nation from many perils of violent 
factions. To cite one instance only, it has enabled the 
people to study the practical machinery of representative 
government, even though the Diet is a voice without 
authority and all real power is still vested in the hands 
of the old ruling class; thus, by process of education, 
the masses of the people are gradually being fitted to 
take their part in the expression of public opinion. 

The effects of the war have undoubtedly disturbed the 
calculations of Japan's rulers in more than one direction. 
They have produced a wave of restlessness, indiscipline, 
and incivility amongst the town-bred labouring classes. 
Indeed, the sudden ferment of new ideas has manifested 
itself throughout all classes of society. When a professor 
of the Tokyo Imperial University is dismissed for trans- 
lating Prince Kropotkin's Essays on the Blessedness of 
Anarchy, and when, within a comparatively short space 
of time, four young ladies of good family elope with their 
chauffeurs ; when thousands of women meet in a kimono'd 
Convention at Osaka to discuss their rights — ^there is 
evidently something to account for the pessimism of 
Japanese Conservatives, when they declare that the family 
system is in danger and that the nation will perish with 
it. In the same spirit you may hear elderly gentlemen 
in London Clubs predicting the immediate end of the 
British Empire because, for a little while, the deep-rooted 
common-sense of the English working-man has been misled 
by the plausible clap-trap of our parlour Bolsheviks. 



THE JAPAN OF TO-DAY 179 

In the domain of politics in Japan it is unsafe to attach 
too much importance to the currents of thought which 
prevail at any particular moment, however deep they may 
appear to be. For your Japanese, like the Athenians of 
old, is ever avid of new things, ever ready to follow after 
strange gods ; his intellectual creed is largely a matter of 
fashion. Therefore it would seem unwise to exaggerate, 
as many do, the significance of the tide of democratic 
opinions which flowed with such force immediately after 
the defeat of Germany. It is still strong enough to make 
many competent observers believe in the impending 
triumph of genuine Liberalism over the Mihtary Party, 
and it certainly accounts for much of the fervour of public 
opinion on the subject of universal suffrage. It is some- 
thing, of course, that the word " democracy " is no longer 
tabu to the platform and Press; that the prestige of 
Liberalism has been increased, and that of the Prussian- 
ised bureaucracy correspondingly diminished, since the 
collapse of German militarism. But of late there have 
been signs of reaction, signs that the vogue of Liberal and 
Democratic ideas is on the wane. Much of its first strength 
was derived from popular acceptance of the world's new 
gospel of Democracy, as proclaimed by President Wilson, 
but its ardour has been unmistakably dampened by 
gradual perception of the truth that the world is not 
going to be saved by fine phrases. If the Mihtary Party 
in Japan — stronghold of the reactionaries — can now take 
new heart of grace, the fact is largely due to President 
Wilson's insistence on racial discrimination at the Paris 
Conference and to the American Senate's refusal to 
subscribe to the League of Nations. 

Without under-rating the strength of Liberalism in 
Japan, I beUeve that it is not likely to achieve a real 
triumph over the Military Party unless some of the 
elements which support the latter are convinced of the 
danger of national isolation. Surely it is significant of 
the real state of affairs, of the entrenched strength of the 
bureaucracy, when a progressive leader, such as Yukio 



180 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

Ozaki, declines to organise and lead a Labour Party, and 
advises Labour that for the present it should endeavour 
to secure better education as a step towards exercising 
greater influence. Rice riots and labour strikes have 
their significance, of course, but one can hardly beHeve 
in the " will to power " of Liberalism and democracy in 
Japan, until there is evidence of a determined national 
movement to make the Diet a sovereign assembly, not 
only representative of the people, but able to give effect to 
its resolutions. Of this, although ricksha coolies discuss 
" de-mo-kra-sie " at street corners, there is as yet no sign, 
even in the high places of Liberahsm. Even supposing 
that the actual rulers of the country — ^the aristocratic 
military and bureaucratic influences of the leading Clans 
— agree to please Demos by not opposing universal 
suffrage, what difference can it make whether there be 
two, or fifteen, million voters, so long as their elected 
House wields no power except a very limited power of 
obstruction, so long as the Government remains at the 
mercy of the mihtary and naval General Staff ? 

In discussing such questions with politicians of all 
parties in Japan, one gets a curious impression of con- 
flicting instincts — of a desire, on the one hand, to see Japan 
take her place amongst the politically progressive nations, 
and, on the other hand, of a strange reluctance to discuss 
the mysterious power of the Military Party. When, for 
instance, I asked Baron Hayashi to explain why neither 
the Kenseikai nor the Independent Party in the Diet have 
raised the vital question of the secret Military Agreement 
with China, the only explanation he could give was that 
the Japanese people " are very proud of their Army." 
Yet the next man you talk to will tell you that the prestige 
of the military class has now so greatly diminished that no 
young woman of good family will marry an officer if she 
can possibly avoid it. Most Japanese statesmen are quite 
prepared to recognise the justice of the contention that, 
if the renewal of the Anglo- Japanese Alliance is to produce 
any satisfactory result, England must feel secure that the 



THE JAPAN OF TO-DAY 181 

high contracting party in Japan is not only willing, but 
able, to fulfil its share of the pact. But, as matters stand, 
this is not the case. In foreign affairs, such as the direc- 
tion of policy in China, the hidden hand of the General 
Staff undoubtedly dominates the Cabinet. 

How, you may ask, is this possible? By an Imperial 
Ordinance of December 19, 1908, it was ordained that 
the Minister of War must be either a General or a 
Lieutenant-General, that is to say, one of a total of 
seventy-seven officers on the active list. Similarly, by an 
ordinance of March 31, 1916, it was laid down that the 
Minister of Marine must be one of a list of forty-five 
Admirals and Vice- Admirals on the active list. These 
Ministers dominate the Cabinet whenever (as in the case 
of China) they attend with specific instructions from the 
General Staff and from Prince Yamagata behind it. For 
the resignation of the War Minister, if it took place, 
would only mean the appointment of another officer from 
the specified list, acting under the same old orders. To 
take a concrete case. If the Hara Cabinet were categoric- 
ally to decline to accept General Tanaka's views on the 
China question, and to insist on the cancellation of the 
Military Agreements at Peking, the General's resignation 
would mean the dissolution of the Government, for with- 
out the consent of the Army and Navy, a Cabinet cannot 
exist. The present condition of affairs differs but little 
in reality from that which was attained at the Restora- 
tion by a transference of power from the old feudal Lords 
to the ruhng Clans of Satsuma and Choshiu, with Mikado- 
worship as a ralljdng-point for the people. A demand for 
popular rights followed naturally from the abohtion of the 
old feudal system, but the Constitution which the Elder 
Statesmen provided was what the Japanese call " a bone 
without marrow." Its Diet was never intended to control 
the Government, and until the Constitution is altered, it 
never can. Now every member of the Diet, every writer 
of the Japanese Press, knows this perfectly well. All 
of them will discourse most earnestly about universal 



182 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

suffrage, about a conciliatory policy in China, about the 
renewal of the Alliance, labour reforms, and what-not, but 
one and all carefully avoid reference to the only question 
that really matters. When the Kenseikai or the Press 
begin to move in earnest for the revocation of the Imperial 
Ordinances, to which I have referred above, when the 
Government can give the portfolio of the War Ministry 
to a civihan, it will be time enough to regard Liberalism 
in Japan as a completely effective factor in the situation. 
But not before. 

There is much food for thought in the fact that even 
the leading Intellectuals, men who profess ultra-demo- 
cratic opinions, and those young sprigs of nobility who 
recently started a movement for the abolition of hereditary 
peerages, one and all fight shy of any serious discussion 
of the Military Party question. And in the end it is diffi- 
cult to avoid the conclusion expressed by the cynical 
Mr. Pooley, that nearly every one who is any one in official 
Japan, is closely bound by ties of some sort — marriage, 
feudal patronage, or Clan loyalty — ^to one or other of the 
two great Clans, which since 1873 have controlled not 
only the Army and the Navy, but nearly every depart- 
ment of the public service. And when one remembers that 
from the very first, after their usurpation of the govern- 
ment, these fighting Clans have been steadily bent on an 
aggressive military policy — particularly directed against 
China — one begins to realise why it is so difficult to elicit 
any serious criticism of that policy. Every one professes 
to deplore it ; every one will tell you that the influences 
behind are steadily waning ; but no public man ever dares 
to attack it openly. It is at first difficult to reconcile 
this condition of affairs with other such signs of the times 
as the younger generation's excursions into Socialism, or 
the movement in favour of Labour Unions ; but the ex- 
planation lies, of course, in the fact that, in the Orient, 
society is an aggregation of families, and the Clan system 
therefore an integral part of the national life. 

In regard to such questions as universal suffrage and 



THE JAPAN OF TO-DAY 183 

labour's right to form unions, I found much more evidence 
of genuine interest in the Press and amongst the people 
of Tokyo, than in the ranks of the politicians, I was 
present in the Strangers' Gallery of the Diet on the last 
day of the Suffrage Bill debate, when the House was 
dramatically dissolved, and I was impressed by the 
orderly and decorous behaviour of the Chamber. There 
were interruptions, of course, but the proceedings as a 
whole were extremely dignified — rather disappointing, in 
fact, as the vast number of policemen in the adjoining 
streets and the predictions of radical enthusiasts had 
seemed to justify the prospect of wigs on the green. The 
number of youthful members was comparatively small 
and the general appearance of the House of Representa- 
tives very different to that of Young China's Parliament. 
And I came away from the debate with much the same 
sense of unreality that one feels nowadays in our own 
House of Commons when the party voting has been pre- 
ordained, and neither the wit nor wisdom of the greatest 
of orators can change one jot of it. One felt that neither 
the supporters nor the opponents of universal suffrage 
could really be in earnest, as they all knew that an increase 
of the electorate would merely confer on a larger number 
of people the right to elect members of a House which 
has little or nothing to do with the actual government of 
the country. There are honest men and able men in the 
Tokyo Diet, but, like politicians all the world over, they 
have no ambition for the martyr's crown, and are generally 
prepared to take things (including their salaries) as they 
come. 

In the same way, one is surprised at the average 
business man's comparative indifference to the labour 
problems which, sooner or later, employers in Japan will 
have to face like the rest of the world. On all sides you 
will hear complaints of the workers' newly-developed 
habits of laziness, of their exorbitant demands and sense- 
less strikes, and Japanese employers are wont to lay 
particular stress upon the modern youth's lack of disciplinq 



184 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

and good manners, as new and unpleasant signs of the 
change in times. But you hear comparatively Uttle of 
the probable effect upon Japanese labour of those dynamic 
ideas which are changing the whole structure of Indus- 
trialism in the West. Japanese capitalists — and especially 
those whose new fortunes have been made during the war 
— appear to devote remarkably little attention to labour 
unrest in their own country. At a Tokyo meeting of 
" big business " men early in 1920, mostly connected with 
shipping, a proposal to inaugurate a modest scheme of 
profit-sharing was almost unanimously voted down as 
quixotic foolishness. In coming from China to Japan I 
had fully expected to find widespread symptoms of unrest 
among the workers, and a corresponding uneasiness 
amongst employers ; one could hardly fail to get some such 
impression from a study of the Treaty Ports' Press. But 
a closer study of the subject on the spot led me to the 
conclusion that the observers who create this impression 
(Uke those who have written of the student movement in 
China) attach an exaggerated importance to surface 
phenomena, whereas the employer of labour rehes upon 
the fact that the national virtue of loyalty, in any great 
crisis, still possesses as strong a hold upon the masses of 
industrial workers as it does upon the Army. He knows, 
or thinks he knows, that so long as the family system 
remains the foundation of Japan's social structure, the 
gospel of Karl Marx will make no headway. 

Needless to say, there are some big businesses, like the 
Mitsu-bishi Company, which are looking ahead, introduc- 
ing real reforms, and improving the conditions of hfe for 
their workers ; but, broadly speaking, there is very little 
evidence to be found in Japan of a general desire that the 
country should subscribe to the findings of any inter- 
national Labour Conference. On the contrary, there is 
evidence of a very definite desire to let things be, to allow 
Japanese industry to enjoy the competitive advantage of 
free trade in human material, unfettered by any restric- 
tions as to child labour, hours of work, or a minimum wage. 









l.l'iuua.ix] 



THE RICE HARVEST, JAPAN. 




B. T. Prideaux] 



PRIMITIVE TRANSPORT IN JAPAN. 



THE JAPAN OF TO-DAY 185 

It is true that many people on the spot hold a different 
opinion, and point to the increasing number of strikes, and 
the movement in favour of labour unions, as proof that 
Japanese labour is beginning to find itself. There are 
one or two " big business " Japanese who believe that 
industrial conditions must be radically changed if Japan 
is to hold her own in competition with Western nations. 
It may be so ; but against these views two solid facts 
stand out : (i) That there are 25,000 factories in Japan 
employing over two million hands, and that until now 
the Government has gently but firmly declined to allow 
them the organisation of Labour Unions ; (2) that there 
is as yet no organised Labour Party in the country, nor 
any prominent politician who is anxious to form or to lead 
one. There is not even an organised Socialist movement 
in Japan. Mr. Ozaki is probably right when he advises 
the working classes to get themselves a better education ; 
but he has omitted to tell them how they are to get it. 

While there is yet no sign of any effective organisation 
on the part of labour, it is also undoubtedly true that 
industrialism has produced, and is producing, a type of 
working man very different to those of old Japan. In 
him Ream's prediction is verified : sordid commerciaUsm 
has led to spiritual decay. Gone, as far as the pubhc is 
concerned, are the old restraints of the Samurai tradi- 
tion, the old virtues of courtesy and dignity and self- 
control. The working classes of Tokyo and other swarm- 
ing hives of toilers (though they may still bear favourable 
comparison as regards manners with those of many 
Western countries) have become distinctly rude, quarrel- 
some, and lazy as compared with their forefathers. Some 
of these unpleasant characteristics may possibly be 
transient, attributable to the swollen head which comes 
from a rapidly swollen purse, but of the increasing rude- 
ness of the man in the street — as distinct from the man 
in the field — there can be no doubt. It impresses itself 
most forcibly upon the tourists of the beaten track in 
Japan and upon the dwellers at the Treaty Ports, for the 



186 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

sad but true reason that the very worst classes of Japanese 
are those who have come into close contact with foreigners. 
No one who revisits Japan to-day after some years of 
absence can fail to be struck by the fact that the relations 
between foreigners and natives are distinctly more strained 
than they used to be. The ill-feeUng on both sides is 
widespread and unmistakable. Making every allowance 
for trade rivalry and the somewhat aggressive quahty of 
self-assertion which the lower classes of Japanese have 
developed since the war with Russia, the prevalence of 
this unconcealed hostility, in a community which has 
everything to gain from friendly relations, is significant. 
When one remembers that at the time of the Russo- 
Japanese War the sympathies of Englishmen and 
Americans were all on the side of the Japanese, it is a 
little difficult to account for so complete a revulsion of 
feehng. There are, of course, faults on both sides. The 
Japanese, acutely sensitive in their amour fropre since 
Japan became one of the " Big Five," resent the European 
residents' assumption of superiority, and this feehng has 
been distinctly aggravated by the " racial equahty " 
discussion at Versailles. There is also no denying that 
many European presidents — especially among the old- 
timers — are unable to recognise the fact that the Japanese 
now consider themselves, with some show of justice, to 
have " grown up " as a nation ; many of them habitually 
display a lack of courtesy and consideration for Japanese 
feehngs which would inspire resentment in a worm. I 
have known an Enghshwoman to get into a first-class 
railway carriage, where there were half a dozen well- 
dressed Japanese, and remark in a loud voice on " the 
repulsive habits of these creatures. ' ' (It is true that many 
Japanese travellers take their boots off and that they are 
somewhat lavish with orange peel, but then this happens 
to be their country.) In the same way, I have heard an 
American traveller on board a Japanese ship crossing the 
Pacific hold forth for the benefit of a smoke-room audience, 
including many Japanese, on the somewhat delicate topic 



THE JAPAN OF TO-DAY 187 

of the position of woman in Japan. The increasingly 
strained relations between the Japanese and foreign resi- 
dents in Japan are also attributable in some measure to 
the fact that, within the last few years, the prestige of the 
white races has been considerably lowered by the arrival 
in the Far East of certain types of Europeans and 
Americans heretofore happily unknown in these parts : 
of barbarous Bolsheviks, gorged with blood-stained loot, 
of evil women and camp followers that are the flotsam 
and jetsam from Siberia. And from America there has 
come since the war a class of business man new to the 
East, hustling bagmen and touts of the baser kind 
(generally of German- Jew extraction), who have created a 
deplorable impression, both on the Japanese and the 
Chinese. 

One of the oldest residents of Yokohama attributed the 
increasing dislike of the Japanese shown by foreigners to 
remembrance of several things that have happened since 
1914, which most Anglo-Saxons in the country find it 
difficult to forgive or forget. First, he said Englishmen 
felt deeply, and still resent bitterly, the concerted attack 
made by the Japanese Press upon Great Britain in 1916, 
Then there is always the feeling of sympathy for China, 
as the under-dog, and dislike of the policy of the aggressor, 
which chose the moment when all the world was at war 
to bully and despoil its helpless neighbour. Then there 
was the fact that, while Japan took credit to herself for 
joining the Allies, not only was she never really in the 
war, but that she had made lucrative opportunities of 
her Allies' necessities, and developed her trade in ship- 
ping as fast as possible at their expense. Finally, there 
were the old complaints, if anything more acute than 
before, of the Japanese trader's lack of commercial 
morahty, of his violation of trade-marks, of contracts 
unfulfilled, and of goods not up to sample. If ever there 
was a time in the history of Japan when patriotism and 
foresight should have endeavoured to estabhsh a good 
reputation for Japanese goods abroad, it was during the 



188 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

unparalleled opportunity created for her by the war; 
yet it remains an astonishing paradox that a nation which 
has proved itself capable of so much self-sacrificing devo- 
tion in other ways, should still be unable to practise 
ordinary honesty in commerce, though most of its leaders 
realise that the country's future must largely depend 
upon it. 

The increasing dislike shown by most Europeans for the 
Japanese is by no means confined to Japan. From Peking 
to Penang, you will find indisputable evidence of it, afloat 
and ashore. Recognising and endeavouring to explain it. 
Baron Ishii stated in America that the seeds of this ill-will 
have been insidiously planted by German propagandists. 
Marquis Okuma, writing in the Asian Review, is inclined 
to ascribe it chiefly to jealousy of Japan's marvellous 
progress in warfare and industry, but he also thinks it 
possible that his countrymen may have waxed " selfish 
and conceited " as the result of their successes. Marquis 
Saionji, on his return to Tokyo in September 1919, deplored 
the fact that " Japan had become a general object of 
distrust and misunderstanding; a fact not only deeply 
injurious to Japan, but very unfortunate for foreign 
nations, whose policy in the Far East is influenced thereby. 
It was the duty of the nation to inspire a spirit of confi- 
dence and good- will among its friends abroad." 

I have selected these three utterances by leading states- 
men to show that public opinion in Japan is seriously 
concerned at the world's lack of confidence and good- 
will ; deeply conscious also of the fact that the antipathies 
which have been aroused are something wider and deeper 
than the local animosities of Treaty Port traders. Every- 
where amongst educated people in Japan to-day, there is 
evidence of the whole country's very real fear of moral 
isolation. On the day before my departure from Tokyo 
in March 1920, I lunched with Mr. Inouye, President of 
the Bank of Japan, to meet a small party of bankers and 
business men. They were all men of wide experience 
at home and abroad, captains of industry, intimately 



THE JAPAN OF TO-DAY 189 

acquainted with the State-controlled machinery of 
Japanese commerce and finance, and one and all were 
evidently much concerned at their country's peril of 
isolation and most anxious to see it averted by a renewal 
of the Anglo-Japanese Alliance. They recognised the 
supreme importance of establishing friendly relations, as 
a basis of satisfactory trade with China, and they realised 
also the dangers which threaten Japan's imperfectly 
developed industrial efficiency in the competition of 
more highly organised countries. The frankly expressed 
opinions of these men, representing the best brains of the 
country, seem to me to justify the conclusion that " big 
business " in Japan is quite prepared to support a renewal 
of the Alliance under conditions which will guarantee 
fair treatment of China in the first place, and, in the 
second place, absolute reciprocity in matters such as 
trademarks and coast trade facilities, wherein British 
and American merchants have hitherto suffered great 
disadvantage. 

I refer to this particular conversation because it was 
typical of many, which produced a cumulative impression 
that the keynote of Japanese policy in the immediate 
future is likely to be national security at all costs. It is 
dangerous to dogmatise in such matters, but it appears to 
me that, politics apart, there is a new and very influential 
school of thought in Japan which has reahsed that the 
times are critical, that the nation stands hteraUy at the 
parting of the ways, and that continuance in the path of 
unjustifiable aggression in China may well lead to disaster. 
The men who hold these views feel also that, before Japan 
can deal on fair and equal terms with Great Britain or 
France or the United States, she must find a way to put 
an end to the autocratic power of the Military Party and 
to make the nation's elected representatives responsible 
for its foreign policy. The crucial question of the whole 
Far Eastern problem remains therefore to-day where it 
was five years ago : Are the Japanese Progressives in 
earnest, and if so, how long will it take them to achieve 



190 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

this fundamental change ? Opinion on this question is so 
hopelessly divided amongst the Japanese themselves, that 
the stranger within their gates may be excused from 
attempting to answer it. 

There is no doubt that the alternative, as prescribed by 
stalwart Imperialists of the Black Dragon school, contains 
much that is attractive to the elemental Jingo which 
lurks in most human beings. A very alluring thing is the 
great Pan- Asian programme of the MiUtarists : an Empire 
of the East, greater than that of ancient Rome or modern 
England, over which the flag of the Rising Sun shall float 
in majesty unchallenged. It is Mouravieff's dream in a 
new guise; and yet not new, for the fighting Clans of 
Satsuma and Choshiu have long pursued the vision of 
Japan as overlord of Asia. The writings of one Yoshida 
Shoin, a leader of the Choshiu Clan, who died in 1859, 
proved clearly that the Mihtary Party of that date had 
their plans all laid for the gradual annexation of Formosa, 
Korea, Saghalien, Manchuria, and Eastern Siberia. These 
plans were then deferred, but by no means abandoned, 
because the Clan leaders of that day had sense enough to 
perceive the wisdom of the advice which Ito gave them, 
namely, that Japan should set herself to acquire the 
appliances and sciences of the West before attempting a 
policy of aggression. The Military Party of to-day can 
point with justifiable pride to the record of their achieve- 
ments during the sixty years that have passed since Ito 
gave them that advice ; they can also remind their country- 
men that, as the result of two successful wars, a substantial 
portion of their programme has already been accomplished. 
On these grounds they can appeal to the racial pride and 
martial spirit of the Japanese people. Were it possible of 
immediate attainment, the dream of a great Japanese 
Empire of the East would certainly allure not only the 
bureaucracy, but the masses of the people, to this great 
adventure. But just as in 1895, when the prudent 
wisdom of the Elder Statesmen realised that it was 
impossible for Japan to cling to her fruits of victory when 



THE JAPAN OF TO-DAY 191 

threatened by the coaUtion of Russia, France, and Ger- 
many, so to-day the same wisdom appears to have per- 
ceived that the time has come to call a halt to the aggres- 
sive policy of the Clansmen in China. They certainly fear 
that persistence in this course may lead to a very danger- 
ous position of isolation, and they also seem to realise that, 
as in i860, the nation needs to set its house in order 
and to take careful stock of its position before embarking 
on any perilous enterprise. The immediate future, the 
adjustment of the present intolerable condition of affairs 
at Peking, lies on the knees of the gods. The Japanese 
Government's formidable naval programme is a disturbing 
feature of the situation. Nevertheless, considering it in 
the light of all the information available, I venture to 
believe that before long Japan will see fit to abandon the 
policy of military aggression and will concentrate all her 
efforts upon obtaining economic ascendancy in China. 
The consolidation of national security being the first aim 
of her statesmen, an alliance with Great Britain, the 
leading naval Power, is evidently essential for the fulfil- 
ment of that purpose. If these views are well founded, 
the Military Party, which mocked at the Alhance in 1916, 
will be obliged to perform a graceful volteface, and in so 
doing abandon, for the present at all events, its secret 
claim to rule the rulers of Peking. But the Pan-Asian 
dreamers will bide their time for all that, and the dream 
itself will never die. 



CHAPTER X 

THE INDEPENDENCE MOVEMENT IN KOREA 

It is a curious and significant fact, indicative of the 
complexity of the problems which await the League of 
Nations, that the United States should have come to 
be recognised ^s the spiritual home of the new gospel 
of " self-determination," and therefore in a large measure 
responsible for the birth and growth of the Independence 
Movement in Korea. For, as an American writer of 
wide experience in world affairs has recently observed,^ 
the whole history of the United States has been that 
of a nation of " imperiahsts, expansionists, unionists, 
enactors of the doctrine that a small State in a strategic- 
ally vital relation to a larger State must accommodate 
its freedom to the security of its larger neighbour. In 
words and in deeds, the United States have denied that 
a small nation has a right to independence where such a 
right infringes the higher right of a vastly larger nation 
to health and tranquillity behind secure frontiers. Cuba, 
Porto Rico, Haiti, San Domingo, the whole Caribbean, 
both flanks of the Panama Canal, the Pacific — ^they all 
tell the same story." And again he observes : " The 
right of the few to liberty is not so high a right as the 
right of the many to live. Did not Lincoln, with his 
hand firmly upon the sword-hilt, say to the Confederate 
States : ' You have not a right to self-determination that 
imperils the peace and well-being of the American 
continent ? ' " 

In other words, self-determination, like the principle 
of the innate equahty of all men, depends for its appli- 
cation upon time and place, and, at the long last, upon 

1 Edward Price Bell in The Times, December 9, 1920. 
192 



THE INDEPENDENCE MOVEMENT 193 

force. Contrasted with the activities of those of her 
citizens who beheve that the Great War has brought us 
within sight of the Promised Land and the Brotherhood 
of Man, the attitude of the United States Government 
towards Korea's aspirations to independence affords a 
striking object-lesson, one of the kind which leads the 
logically-minded Latin and the astute Oriental to impute 
hypocrisy to the Anglo-Saxon. For these races lack the 
idealist quality of mind which fails or refuses to perceive 
the wide gulf which lies between benevolent theories and 
hard practice. 

There is no disguising the plain truth that the recent 
agitation in favour of self-determination for Korea owed 
much of its inspiration originally to the influence and 
teaching of American missionaries in the Hermit King- 
dom, and finally to President Wilson's momentous 
declaration that the League of Nations had appeared 
upon the scene with a Heaven-sent mission, "to prevent 
the domination of small nations by big ones." What 
Mr. Thomas W. Lamont has said of the political in- 
fluence exercised by American missionaries in China ^ 
is even more conspicuously true of their work in Korea : 
they and their " Intellectual " pupils have undoubtedly 
done, and are doing, their best to " develop Korea from 
a people into a nation." Another well-known American 
writer,^ who has lately made a careful study of the 
actual position of affairs in Korea, deplores the political 
activities for which so many American and Canadian 
missionaries have been conspicuous since the establish- 
ment of Japan's " Protectorate " in 1908. He reminds 
them that the American people openly sympathised with 
the Japanese cause in their Russian war, and that President 
Roosevelt approved, and formally recognised, the annexa- 
tion of Korea by Japan ; and this being so, he urges them 
to render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, and 
to conduct their religious-teachings with proper respect 

^ Vide supra, p. 127. 

2 Charles H. Sherrill, in Scribner's Magazine for March 1920. 
o 



194 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

for lawfully constituted authority. " There are too 
many of our missionaries," he observes, " who have lived 
so long in Korea that they think they own the country, 
and they can countenance no changes therein, even 
improvements. In this connection it is discouraging 
to note that in that flourishing missionary field, with 
hundreds of missionaries and over 300,000 Korean con- 
verts, Christianity seems to have left its converts about 
as ignorant and filthy as before their conversion, and 
nothing like so advanced in civilisation and decency 
of life as the near-by Buddhists and Shintoists of 
Japan." 

Mr. Sherrill is an uncompromising reahst, with the 
courage not only of his convictions, but of his conver- 
sions. Touching the question of " foreigners unthink- 
ingly abusing a nation's hospitaUty by acts or teachings 
subversive of its authority," he confesses to having 
believed, before visiting the Far East, that democracy 
was the best form of government for all peoples." A 
study on the spot " of the contrast between the excellently 
functioning Imperial Government of Japan on the one 
hand, and, on the other, the disheartening venality of 
many offtcials of the Chinese Republic, plus the situation 
in Siberia made too free for democracy," has re-adjusted 
his point of view. 

Now, setting aside the question of the responsibility 
for the agitation in favour of Korean independence, let 
us turn to consideration of its actual results in Korea 
and abroad. Mr. F. A. McKenzie, an English writer 
who has always sympathised deeply with Korea in her 
defencelessness, and pleaded her cause against aggression, 
has recently published an account of the events which 
followed upon the Declaration of Independence, signed 
and promulgated by thirty-three Korean patriots in 
March 1919. His book, Korea's Fight for Freedom, 
confirms and amplifies the indictment which he brought 
against the Japanese Government in an earlier work 
(1908). The righteous indignation which he felt on the 



I 



THE INDEPENDENCE MOVEMENT 195 

subject of Korea's wrongs in the days of the Protectorate, 
has since been intensified by reason of the sufferings 
and humiliations which the Koreans have been com- 
pelled to endure since the annexation of their country 
in 1910, Mr. McKenzie, having been an eye-witness 
of those sufferings and humiliations, now appeals to the 
Christian Churches, and to the statesmen of the United 
States, Canada, and Great Britain, to demonstrate their 
practical sympathy and support on behalf of a sorely- 
oppressed people. His indictment of the Japanese 
Government's harsh rule and policy of savage repression, 
supported by the detailed evidence of a cloud of wit- 
nesses, is not pleasant reading. It is a record of grievous 
tyranny, of wholesale arrests of political offenders and 
suspects, of inhuman treatment of thousands of untried 
prisoners, of floggings and severe tortures inflicted upon 
men, women, and children, of schoolboys and young 
girls shamefully beaten. Many of the charges of terror- 
ism and cruelty which he brings against the Japanese 
administration in Korea have not only been substantiated 
by independent Japanese witnesses, but practically ad- 
mitted by the Imperial Government at Tokyo. In 
August 1919, an Imperial Rescript was issued, announcing 
that the Government of Korea was to be reformed, the 
miUtary gendarmerie in many districts abolished, and 
replaced by a civil police under the orders of the local 
governors, and a Liberal regime instituted, under which 
Koreans are to enjoy the same civic rights, liberties, and 
privileges as the Japanese. The Military Party's poUcy 
of terrorism and methods of frightfulness have, in fact, 
been repudiated, and assurances publicly given that 
the administration will henceforward be conducted in 
accordance with the principles originally laid down by 
Prince Ito, who deprecated forcible exploitation and 
aimed at securing a genuine amalgamation of the Koreans 
with the Japanese Empire by processes of education and 
conciliation. There are many observers in the Far East 
who doubt the efficacy, not to say the sincerity, ot 



196 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

these latest reforms, and who beheve that the poUcy 
of forcible assimilation, and with it unjust exploitation, 
will be maintained. Mr. McKenzie, amongst others, 
holds that, unless Japanese Liberalism and a policy 
of peaceful expansion can abolish the Militarists and 
their methods once and for all (of which there is as yet 
no sign), Japan's harsh rule in Korea, and her policy 
of aggression in China, will continue, and " eventually 
produce a titanic conflict, of which none can foresee 
the end." 

If these observers are correct in their views, the pros- 
pect of peace in the Far East and goodwill towards men 
is indeed remote. But whether the policy of the Japanese 
Government in the immediate future proves to be wisely 
Liberal or harshly oppressive, one fact remains obvious, 
namely, that many of those who sympathise most strongly 
with the misfortunes of the Korean people, fail to per- 
ceive that the cause and claims of common humanity, 
and the cause of Korean political independence, are 
two separate and distinct questions. There is also a 
very prevalent tendency to overlook the incontestable 
fact that many of the pains and penalties suffered by 
the Koreans since the active assertion of their claims 
to independence are primarily due to the false hopes 
inspired in the patriotic leaders of that movement by 
President Wilson and other well-meaning political vision- 
aries. Mr. McKenzie, at all events, is under no delusion 
on this score. " If any outsider was responsible for 
the uprising of the Korean people," he declares, " that 
outsider was Woodrow Wilson, President of the United 
States." His declaration that the civilised world was 
determined henceforth to protect the rights of weaker 
nations, was " the clarion call to Korea : here was the 
promise of freedom, given by the head of the nation 
they had all learned to love." The grievous fate which 
swiftly overtook the unsophisticated people who hearkened 
to that clarion call, the bitter disappointment that 
awaited their young delegates and leaders, first in America 



THE INDEPENDENCE MOVEMENT 197 

and then at Versailles, should surely suffice to prevent 
even those who sympathise most profoundly with the 
Korean people from incurring this kind of responsi- 
bility, and from encouraging another self-determination 
movement, at least until the day comes when the League 
of Nations shall have become an authoritative Tribunal 
and the acknowledged keeper of the conscience of the 
world. 

The thirty-three Korean patriots who signed and pro- 
mulgated the Declaration of Independence (and paid 
heavily for their courage) fully believed that President 
Wilson's words proclaimed the end of Korea's centuries 
of vassaldom. " A new era," they declared, " wakes 
before our eyes, the old world of force is gone, and the 
new world of righteousness and truth is here." Of 
practical politics, of the great world beyond the Hermit 
Kingdom, these simple old-world scholars and guileless 
enthusiasts knew little or nothing; they only knew 
that, under the rule of Japan, they were humiliated 
and unhappy, and that " after the agony of ten years 
of foreign oppression," the clarion call had sounded 
which was to give them unfettered liberty. Had they 
studied the history of their own country in the light 
of international affairs ; had they remembered how 
many of the great Powers, America included, had solemnly 
guaranteed its independence and then acquiesced with- 
out protest in its annexation as an integral part of the 
Japanese Empire, they might well have hesitated before 
starting on their forlorn crusade. Well had it been for 
them had they been advised to stop and consider how 
far President Wilson's words might be relied upon to 
represent a definite American policy; well had they 
remembered that, only a decade before, President Roose 
velt had declined to intervene on behalf of Korea's inde- 
pendence, on the ground that " it was out of the question 
to suppose that any other nation, with no interest of its 
own at stake, would do for the Koreans what they were 
utterly unable to do for themselves." 



198 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

Had any practical statesmanship been available to 
guide the counsels of the Korean leaders, they must 
have realised that, pending the estabhshment of a League 
of Nations invested with moral or physical authority 
sufficient to enable it to restrain the elemental forces 
and instincts which impel strong nations to expand at 
the expense of their weak neighbours, Japan will con- 
tinue to invoke the law of self-preservation as justification 
for asserting her supremacy in Korea, as a matter of 
vital necessity imposed by economic and strategical 
conditions. For the last fifty years, Korea has been 
(to use Mr. Churchill's phrase) the lynch-pin of Japanese 
policy, the key-land of north-eastern Asia. Her utter 
helplessness has made her the cockpit of the Far East 
and a constant cause of wars between her powerful 
neighbours, in which wars her twenty million people 
have played the part of apathetic spectators, all their 
political activities concentrated meanwhile upon internal 
strife, on treasons, stratagems, and spoils. If Japan 
had not defeated China in 1895, Korea would still be that 
country's humble and misgoverned vassal. Had Japan 
not fought Russia in 1904, the peninsula must then have 
passed into the possession of the Slav. And even the 
sincerest of Korean patriots can hardly overlook the 
fact that Japanese ascendancy was materially assisted 
from 1905 onwards by the II Chin Hoi and other pro- 
Japanese groups of native politicians, and that the 
gendarmerie, by whom most of the brutalities of last 
year were committed, consisted, to some extent, of 
Koreans in Japanese pay. 

I had occasion to discuss the whole question of Japanese 
policy in Korea in February of last year with Dr. Midzuno, 
the new Director-General of Administration, at Seoul. 
While gravely deprecating and regretting the excesses 
committed by the miUtarists in the past, and expressing 
his belief that a Liberal and conciliatory policy would 
produce good results, especially when Korea becomes 
properly represented in the Imperial Diet, Dr. Midzuno 



THE INDEPENDENCE MOVEMENT 199 

denied that the Independence demonstration of 1919 
was in any true sense a national movement. He re- 
minded me that, even against their own Emperor, after 
China's suzerainty had been abolished in 1898, the 
malcontents of the Independence Club had started a 
popular agitation, kept the country in a ferment for 
months, and finally been suppressed by the Conservative 
party and the " Pedlars' Guild " Secret Society, with 
great severity. He pointed out that, from 1894 to 1904, 
when Korea was an independent kingdom, the country 
demonstrated its incapacity for self-government, foreigners 
being the first to recognise the truth that no man's life 
or property was safe from the rapacity of the Court 
party and their myrmidons. He emphasised the fact 
that independent and competent observers, like Mr. 
Frederick Coleman and Mr. A. Judson Brown, have 
testified in their writings to the material improvement 
which has taken place in the condition of the Korean 
peasantry under Japanese administration. Finally we 
came to the question of the League of Nations and the 
inherent right of small nations to self-determination and 
the pursuit of their own kind of happiness. 

Dr. Midzuno is a distinguished scholar, a student of 
international politics, and a firm believer in the Ito 
tradition of administration. " Japan," he said, " is all 
in favour of the League, but as a matter of practical 
poUtics, as things are, she can no more accept the idea 
of an independent Korea than Great Britain can afford 
to recognise an independent Irish Republic." 

Later on, discussing the same question in Tokyo with 
Japanese statesmen and diplomats, I heard the same 
opinion, often more bluntly expressed. " It will be time 
enough to consider the question as one of international 
importance," said an official of the Foreign Office, " when 
the League of Nations is in a position to enforce recog- 
nition of the equahty of races, and to guarantee Korea 
against the political influence and aggressive designs of 
other Powers." 



200 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

But out of the evils of the uprising of 1919, some good 
has come. The strength and sober restraint of the 
movement in Seoul, the earnestness of its dignified 
leaders, belonging to the older generation in Korea, 
together with its forcible appeal to the conscience of 
the civilised world, all had an unmistakable effect upon 
the Japanese Government. Judging by what I saw and 
heard in Seoul and Tokyo, I believe that the Japanese 
authorities have now been led to perceive that the pohcy 
of forcible assimilation has been, and must continue to 
be, a failure, because it merely tends to evoke a strong 
spirit of nationalism among the Koreans and to increase 
their hatred of their new rulers. In attempting to break 
the spirit of the Korean people and to make them accept 
" assimilation," Japan has come up against an un- 
suspected quality of quiet determination in the Korean 
character, a quality which, beneath the appearance of 
apathy, makes the Korean a passive resister and con- 
scientious objector of the most dogged type, too proud 
or too weak to fight, but ready for martyrdom, if needs 
be. The Japanese Government has discovered, as the 
independent investigator sent from Tokyo by the Consti- 
tutional Party reported, that "it is a great mistake of 
Colonial policy to attempt to enforce upon the Koreans, 
with their two thousand years of history, the same 
spiritual and mental training as that of the Japanese 
people." 

Meanwhile, as the case of Korea has been taken up 
by a number of Labour members and " Wee Frees " 
in the House of Commons, and in America by many 
ardent believers in the pure gospel of self-determination, 
it is desirable that they should be quite clear in their 
minds as to the remedial measures to be proposed and 
the manner of their application. In this connection it 
is of interest to note that the Provisional Government 
of the Korean Republic, with its " headquarters " at 
Shanghai, resembles irreconcilable Sinn Fein, in that it 
declines to entertain any discussion of local autonomy. 




< i-5 




THE INDEPENDENCE MOVEMENT 201 

Dominion Home Rule, or full State rights for Korea as 
an integral part of the Japanese Empire, but asserts 
an unswerving claim to absolute and complete inde- 
pendence. It differs from Sinn Fein inasmuch as its 
methods are essentially those of passive resistance; but 
its young " Intellectual " leaders (mostly educated at 
Universities abroad), who have joined together to form 
a Cabinet in partihus, cling firmly to the Wilsonian doc- 
trine of self-determination, and they are just as fully 
convinced as Sinn Fein of their ability to organise and 
maintain a model Republic, equipped with all the latest 
improvements. Like Young China, they completely 
ignore the fact that the great majority of their country- 
men are by nature and education totally unfit to co- 
operate in any system of representative government, and 
that the establishment of a Republic in Korea could 
therefore only mean, as in China, the unchecked ex- 
ploitation of the masses by a small privileged class. 
And just as Young China, while proclaiming its infallible 
panaceas, has failed to do anything whatsoever to im- 
prove the condition of the masses, either physically or 
spiritually, so Young Korea, as represented by this self- 
elected Cabinet at Shanghai, remains wholly absorbed 
in the political aspects of the situation. Needless to say, 
these very able and interesting young men do not repre- 
sent the feelings and needs of the Korean peasantry so 
much as those of the " Korean National Association," 
a society founded in America by Mr. Ahn Chang-ho, 
which claims to have a membership of over a million 
Koreans, living in voluntary exile throughout Manchuria, 
Siberia, and China. Mr. Ahn, Minister for Labour in 
the Provisional Cabinet, has always been distinguished 
for activity in the field of political and patriotic agitation. 
At Shanghai, last February, he declared that the Cabinet 
was being regularly sustained by funds voluntarily 
paid as taxes by the Korean people, " who recognise our 
Government as the only government to which they owe 
allegiance." (Much in the same spirit, in moments of 



202 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

expansion, the Chinese Republican leader, Sun Yat-sen, 
and his friends, are wont to declare that millions of their 
countrymen are ready to follow them and their ideas to 
the death.) One may sympathise with, and admire, 
those ardent spirits, but those foreigners who encourage 
them to hope for the early fulfilment of their political 
aspirations are no better than the blind leaders of blind, 
and the result of such encouragement can only be to 
involve the unsophisticated and inarticulate Korean 
people in further misfortunes. 

Politicians of the ultra-modern school, who profess 
to see neither danger nor difficulty in self-determination 
all round; those who believe that the world will be 
happier and more peaceful when Ireland, India, Egypt, 
and every turbulent State in Europe has been handed 
over to the tender mercies of the group of word-spinners 
which happens to be in the ascendant, will no doubt 
find the case of Korea exceedingly simple. But to those 
old-fashioned people, with whom human nature and 
accomplished facts still carry a certain weight, it will 
probably continue to be advisable, in considering this 
question and its best solution, to devote a certain measure 
of attention to the point of view of the Japanese Govern- 
ment, if only because all the civilised Powers have 
recognised the fact that Korea forms part of the Japanese 
Empire. It is highly desirable that the practical side 
of the question should not be completely obliterated 
by the sentimental, so that, when the question comes 
before the Tribunal of the League of Nations (be it only 
for the registration of a pious opinion) the heathen 
blaspheme not, and the true friends of Korea be not 
stultified. It is devoutly to be hoped that, either with 
or without the League, some equitable settlement of 
many questions in the Far East may be reached before 
Germany emerges again upon the scene in her accustomed 
role of "honest broker." But in preparing for such a 
settlement, we may as well face the fact that, so long 
as the European and American nations are not prepared 



THE INDEPENDENCE MOVEMENT 203 

to confine their activities within the limits of their own 
geographical frontiers, it is futile to expect Japan to 
withdraw from Korea. Great Britain, ruling India, and 
making ready to establish a thinly- veiled protectorate 
over Persia ; France, holding large provinces of what 
was once China ; the United States, steadily expanding, 
for the protection of its position at Panama, over all 
the smaller States of the Caribbean seaboard : upon 
what moral grounds can any of these Powers approach 
Japan and ask her, in the name of humanity and civilisa- 
tion, to surrender her dominion over Korea? Only by 
some self-denying ordinance, universally applied, could 
the high moral argument be invoked, and the only 
alternative is the argument of force. Russia, Germany, 
and France invoked that argument in 1895, when Japan 
was compelled to hand back the Liaotung peninsula to 
China, so that it might be laid open to Russia's " peace- 
ful penetration"; and Japan has not forgotten that 
object lesson of Europe's benevolent sympathy for the 
oppressed. 

Apart from the admitted severities of Japan's military 
regime in Korea, and setting aside all irresponsible 
counsels of political idealism, the Japanese Government 
asserts its justification for remaining as the supreme 
Power in the peninsula on grounds similar to those which, 
in the opinion of reasonable men, justify Great Britain 
in retaining control of Egypt. The record of Japan's 
progressive activities in Korea has been dispassionately 
summarised by an American,^ for the enlightenment of 
his countrymen, in the following words : 

" In December 1918 there were 336,872 Japanese in 
Korea, of whom 66,943 were in Seoul. What are they 
doing for the country and its 18,000,000 people? Its 
range on range of bare hills remind one, travelling from 
the seaport of Fusan to Seoul, of New Mexico and Arizona, 
or Spain, or Algeria. This is because the improvident 

* Charles H. Sherrill, op. cit. 



204 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

Koreans nearly denuded the country of its splendid 
forests. The Japanese (successful foresters, as their own 
pine-clad hills show) have set out no less than 473,000,000 
trees in Korea and are still pressing on with its reforesta- 
tion. They are employing as many Koreans as possible ; 
over three times as many as were so employed in 1910. 
April 3 was selected as Arbour Day, and six years later 
over 750,000 participated in its beneficent exercises. The 
output of the Korean coal-mines has been nearly trebled 
since 1910, Her foreign trade went up from 59,000,000 
yen in 1910 to 131,000,000 in 1917. Her railway mileage 
has doubled under Japanese control. Savings are being 
encouraged, as appears from the last available report 
(January 1917), which shows 827,215 Korean depositors 
and an increase of 177,687 individuals during the pre- 
ceding year. . . . Both highways and street extensions 
show handsome increase, and Seoul, with its many broad 
avenues, is, thanks to the Japanese, one of the best-paved 
cities in the Orient. Extensive harbour improvements 
have transformed the old-fashioned Korean ports into 
models of modern embarkation points. Especially have 
the Japanese encouraged agriculture in their new 
province, and thereby secured constantly increasing 
benefits for the inhabitants, of whom 80 per cent, are 
normally agriculturalists, producing 70 per cent, of their 
country's exports. Model farms, experimental stations, 
and training schools have been set up in many centres, 
and over 1,000,000 yen is thus annually expended to 
uplift the Korean farmer. Left to himself, he would 
cultivate nothing but rice, and when it was harvested, 
wait till next season for the same crop, but the Japanese 
are teaching him new side-lines — fruit trees, cotton, 
sugar-beet, hemp, tobacco, silkworms, sheep-breeding, 
etc. An increase of several hundred per cent, in wheat, 
bean, and barley acreage has been achieved. The cotton 
acreage increased from 1123 cho in 1910 to 48,000 in 1917, 
and the number of fruit trees more than trebled. Numer- 
ous factories, something hitherto unknown in the land, 
have been introduced, affording occupation for thousands 
of Koreans. Startling improvements in health con- 
ditions have been effected by means of hygienic inspec- 
tion and Government hospitals and by new waterworks 
everywhere. The schools, especially industrial schools, 
are vigorously and successfully combating the old Korean 



THE INDEPENDENCE MOVEMENT 205 

ignorance and shiftlessness. The foregoing is a fair 
picture of Japanese rule in Korea, and it richly deserves 
to be hung alongside of the one depicting England's 
service to Egypt, nor need it fear comparison." 

From personal observation on the spot (a brief survey 
only of the surface of things), I am convinced that the 
general condition of the Korean peasantry and their 
standard of living are appreciably higher to-day than 
ever they were, or could have been, under Korean 
administration. And if this be admitted, the practical 
question next presents itself : is it not desirable that 
this material and educational progress should continue, 
even under alien rulers, until such time as the Koreans 
are either fit for self-government, or in a position to 
claim complete social and economic equality with the 
Japanese as fellow-subjects ? Would not the immediate 
application of the principle of self-determination (if it 
were possible) merely throw the country back into the 
chaotic helplessness of the old Hermit Kingdom ? Does 
not the example of present-day China afford sufficient 
proof of the folly of endeavouring to apply Republican 
principles to a people which is by nature and traditions 
incapable of organising any form of representative 
government ? The real Korean question lies here : to 
devise an alternative to Japanese rule, which shall give 
the country (and its neighbours) a reasonable prospect 
of peace and progress. 



PART II 

STUDIES AND IMPRESSIONS 



CHAPTER XI 

ON A JAPANESE PACIFIC LINER 

It was the good ship Shinyo Maru, and she sailed from 
San Francisco for Japan on December 4, 1919, with a full 
complement of passengers, saloon and steerage. When 
I say that she sailed, I mean that by noon all the pas- 
sengers were aboard and that by six o'clock she had put 
out from the wharf into the harbour, but, as a matter of 
fact, it was not until next morning that we put forth 
into the deep. For there was a great gale blowing beyond 
the Golden Gate, a heavy sea breaking on the bar, and 
very little chance of being able to drop the pilot outside. 
The Japanese shipping companies are great sticklers for 
schedules ; there is nothing in their methods or move- 
ments of that easy-going indifference to dates which 
marks the comings and goings of most British and 
American vessels in these waters ; but they are also 
prudent mariners, taking no risk of wind and tide. At 
8 a.m., therefore, we passed out through the Golden 
Gate, and straightway many weak vessels went below, to 
seek the refuge that the cabin grants. 

Our saloon passengers were a strange consortium of 
East and West. The Japanese were in the majority, the 
rest composed of Americans of many types, Britishers for 
Hongkong and the China Ports, Scandinavians, Russians, 
and a plentiful sprinkhng of the chosen people. China 
was represented by one solitary individual, as far as the 
saloon was concerned, and the fact was eloquent of the 
force which at that moment lay behind the anti- Japanese 
boycott. The steerage passengers, fore and aft, were 
practically all Japanese. Of the six hundred there were 
p 209 



210 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

only nine Chinese, half a dozen Hindoos, and a few 
Filipinos. As a rule, in normal times of amity, the 
Toyo Kisen Kaisha carries large numbers of Celestials, 
and the forward steerage is given over to them exclu- 
sively, for peace sake; but as the result of the boycott 
they had taken to travelling by other lines, and fer contra, 
the " China Mail " boats carried hardly any Japanese. 
So much for " the ties with a kindred Asiatic race " of 
the Pan- Asian dream ! So much for the poetic fiction 
of " East is East and West is West " when tested in the 
stern struggle for race survival. There are, no doubt, 
insuperable barriers of creed and colour between East 
and West, permanent causes of jealousy and distrust 
between Anglo-Saxons and Japanese, born of trade 
rivalry and racial ambitions, but they are mild in their 
effects when compared with the antagonism which the 
events of the past ten years have created between the 
Chinese and their cousins of the land of the Rising Sun. 
On the neutral soil of California the clear-cut division 
between the two races is plainly manifested to-day 
in mutual contempt and dislike. Both Chinese and 
Japanese mix freely with the American community for 
purposes of business and pleasure, but rarely at the 
same time and place. The China Commerce Club invites 
no Japanese to its luncheons and receptions nowadays ; 
to do so would merely make everybody uncomfortable, 
and this despite the fact that the leading members of 
the Japanese community are men of liberal education 
and broad views, who have many American friends. It 
is unquestionably true that public opinion in California 
is much more friendly disposed towards the Chinese than 
towards the Japanese at the present time ; but it would, 
I think, be unwise to attach too much importance to 
this fact, or, because of it, to ascribe to either race any 
permanence of superior virtue. The sympathies and 
antipathies of nations are not deep-rooted in racial 
origins, as some would have us believe. Broadly speak- 
ing, they reflect the ever-changing conditions of economic 



ON A JAPANESE PACIFIC LINER 211 

necessity, new phases in the world-wide struggle for 
survival. A century ago, England and Germany were 
fighting France; fifty years hence, the United States 
may have to defend its amassed wealth against a hungry 
League of European nations. Fifteen years ago, when 
Japan fought Russia, American sympathy was all with 
the Land of the Rising Sun, and during the past thirty 
years the Chinese settlers in California and Canada have 
more than once had occasion to complain of harsh treat- 
ment. To-day's distinct preference of the Calif ornian 
for the Chinese is easily explained : he has come to be 
recognised as an indefatigable worker, without inclination 
or capacity for aggression, a passive resister on occasions, 
but asking little more than to be allowed to glean a little 
wealth in the land of plenty, and then to return, dead or 
alive, to his ancestral home. He brings no women with 
him, makes no claim to rights of citizenship or the open 
door, raises no contentious issues. Therefore California, 
needing efficient labour in many fields of industry, looks 
kindly on the Chinese. But the Japanese, more and 
more inclined — nay, compelled — ^to claim a place in the 
sun for their surplus, hungry millions ; a race that has 
proved itself ready and able to fight for that place — this 
is a very different matter. Here is the Yellow Peril 
knocking at the Californian's door, an economic menace 
not to be denied, an issue in which every instinct of self- 
preservation comes directly into conflict with Utopian 
idealism and the doctrine of the Brotherhood of Man. 
And just as most Americans fail to reahse the inexorable 
necessity which compels Japan to seek expansion over- 
seas, so the average Japanese fails to recognise the 
insuperable force of the self -preserving instinct, which 
leads the white races to refuse to grant rights of citizen- 
ship and unfettered competition to Asiatics — to sign, in 
fact, their own death warrant. Only fuller knowledge, 
a better understanding on both sides, can ever solve a 
problem such as this. 
Aboard the Shiny o Mam, as in California, the East was 



212 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

frankly divided against itself and the West stood watch- 
fully between. There were a good number of Cantonese 
stewards, working side by side with Japanese in the 
saloon, and the cook's galley was a Chinese monopoly. 
But the Company had found it possible to prevent 
outbreaks of battle, murder, and sudden death amongst 
them, by rigidly enforcing the drastic rule that in every 
case of battery and assault, all concerned were instantly 
dismissed. It was clear to the least observant eye that 
there was no love lost between the representatives of the 
two races, and that fierce passions smouldered beneath 
the damper of enforced neutrality, but as far as the 
passengers were concerned, their rivalry was conducive 
to efficient service. According to Mr. Kawakami, the 
Japanese are the only civilised race in Asia. It may be 
so — ^it all depends upon whether we regard civilisation 
as a product of machinery, or a state of mind — ^but, 
speaking for myself, I must confess that in the mixed 
company of our saloon, I frequently found myself 
reflecting that the Cantonese stewards cut a more dig- 
nified figure, seemed nearer to the philosophic ideal of 
the Superior Man, than all the rest of us put together. 
The Chinese attitude towards life in general makes 
them, as a race, an embodiment of the Intellectual Ideal. 
Incidentally, it also explains the failure of this ideal to 
achieve material reward in the world of things-as-they- 
are. 

All the executive officers of the Toyo Kisen Kaisha 
are now Japanese — ^the last of the English captains have 
been replaced since 1917 — but the Shinyo Maru carries, 
nevertheless, for the benefit of non- Japanese passengers, 
a " travelling " doctor (American), an Irish chief steward, 
an English purser, and an American barber. After a 
good deal of experience in all the Seven Seas, I can 
honestly say that I know of few steamship routes on 
which the passenger will find more kindly consideration, 
more courtesy and care, than on this Japanese line. And 
this courtesy and consideration are by no means confined 



ON A JAPANESE PACIFIC LINER 213 

to the saloon passengers. For the steerage, there are 
theatrical performances and wrestling matches, organised, 
and obviously enjoyed, by the crew; and on Sundays 
there are religious services, conducted by Japanese 
Christians and attended by surprisingly large congre- 
gations. 

The number of small children belonging to the Japanese 
steerage passengers on this voyage was remarkable : 
there were some seventy of them. Now every one of 
these quaint little bundles is a political asset of no small 
importance to Japan, because, as an American-born 
citizen, he or she can claim rights of land tenure denied 
to, and coveted by, the ordinary Japanese immigrant. 
It is evident that the fundamental purpose of the " gentle- 
man's agreement " will be nullified, or at least greatly 
modified, if large numbers of Japanese children are born 
on American soil. It is also evident that the marriages 
of " picture brides " in Cahfornia were an expedient 
devised and quietly encouraged to promote that end. 
It was a characteristically Oriental stratagem, intended 
to take advantage of the curiously unpractical and self- 
contradictory nature of America's naturalisation laws, 
and to build up, within the letter of those laws, rapidly 
increasing Japanese communities, with full rights of 
citizenship, on American soil. It seemed therefore, at 
first sight, a surprising thing that the Shiny o Maru should 
be taking back to Japan so many valuable little stakes 
pegged out at such pains in the land of promise. Eco- 
nomically, and perhaps politically, a Japanese child born 
in California should be worth its weight in gold. There 
was a certain distinguished member of the Japanese 
Diet on board, and to him I went, seeking information 
as to the reason for the return to their native land of 
all these fortunate parents and their precious offspring. 
Anxious, no doubt, to improve the shining hour, he said 
that he beheved these humble workers were leaving the 
inhospitable shores of America because the attitude of 
the Cahfornians towards them had made it impossible 



214 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KQREA 

,for them to continue to live there any longer with any 
peace of mind or self-respect. But subsequent and more 
direct inquiries served to show that the member of the 
Diet was either misleading or misled. I ascertained that 
nearly all these families were going back to Japan for a 
holiday, with plenty of money in their pockets ; returning 
to their native haunts, much as the Irish do, to astonish 
their kinsfolk with unwonted prodigality and tales of 
adventure ; to put the elder children to school and let 
the younger learn something of the glories of Dai Nippon ; 
but all fully intending to return before long to the land 
of easy money. They were, in fact, mostly joy-riders, 
and as cheerful a lot of human beings as one could wish 
to meet. 

But the steerage contained also another and a sad 
type of home-coming Japanese — the sick, the broken- 
down, and the crippled, returning to die in the land of 
their fathers. The pitiful story of this human wreckage 
was emphasised by immediate contact and contrast with 
all the young and joyous life about them; no doubt 
but that they felt the pathos of it themselves, for suicides 
were sadly frequent occurrences in that sad company. 
On the previous trip of the Shinyo Maru there had been 
four cases ; there is seldom a voyage in which some of 
these unfortunates do not slip overboard, unnoticed, to 
oblivion. On this trip one case occurred, typical of the 
old Japanese ideal of conjugal fidelity. At midnight, 
under the pale glimpses of the stars, a husband and wife 
tied themselves together and jumped overboard, leaving 
a polite note of apology to the Captain, with a pathetic 
little valedictory verse from " two dewdrops that merge 
softly in the sea." The husband was a young bank 
clerk, invalided home with consumption, and with nothing 
but pain and poverty to look forward to for himself and 
his wife; and so, when the moonlight lay like silver 
upon the wine-dark sea, they " perished on the midnight, 
without pain." Surely, a beautiful death. But the 
frequency of suicides amongst the younger generation of 



ON A JAPANESE PACIFIC LINER 215 

the Japanese seems to be one of several symptoms of social 
instability, of the unhealthy unrest of a people which 
has striven to divest itself too rapidly of the old ways, 
the old wisdom, of the East. Happily, in Japan itself 
one finds evidence to-day of a healthy reaction against 
this feverish modernism. 

There was a band of alleged musicians aboard the 
Shinyo Maru, a well-meaning quartette of industrious 
blowers and scrapers, whose business it was to produce 
dance music, grand opera, or hymns, as required, which 
they did with a perfectly obvious indifference to melody 
or harmony. It is natural enough, I suppose, that 
ultra-modern Japan should wish to prove that there is 
nothing in the outfit of Western civiUsation which cannot 
be produced from her own native sources ; nevertheless, 
these attempts to make European music popular, not 
only as an art, but as a profession, seem to me pathetically 
suggestive of laudable intentions misdirected. In Tokyo 
they will assure you that the masses really understand 
and enjoy the band music which is dispensed to them 
by the authorities, and you will hear much learned argu- 
ment based on the meteoric career of Madame Myra; 
but for all that, I venture to assert that it is no more 
possible to popularise the music of Europe in China or 
Japan than to make these people appreciate the doctrines 
of our sectarian Churches, and for precisely the same 
reason. It is undeniable, I admit, that here and there 
individuals may be able to perform the necessary miracle 
of psychic acrobatics; but for the masses, the feat is 
simply impossible. In the matter of European band 
music, Japan would be well advised to allow the gentle 
Filipino to discourse it. But if, as a matter of patriotic 
policy, Japanese liners must carry home-made bands, 
then let them at least not play to us whilst we eat. Their 
efforts, however chaotic, may be defensible when confined 
to the production of the noise required by those who 
fox-trot and shimmy it on the quarter deck; but they 
serve to wreck the first travail of digestion. 



216 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

That which strikes one most forcibly after a few days 
at sea aboard a Japanese hner, is the meticulous quality 
of the official organisation, which attends to every detail 
of the passenger's day, which has an hour for everything 
and everything at its hour. It is evidently part of the 
business of the Captain and crew to see to it that the 
travelling public shall never lack for entertainment. The 
wireless news service is chiefly conspicuous by its absence, 
but the ship's printer is kept so busy with programmes 
and announcements of every kind, that for seventeen days 
we are quite content to dispense with news of the outside 
world, to play our own little harmless games, and forget 
those of the politician. Of an evening there is always 
something doing : exhibitions of Japanese fencing and 
wrestling, generally excellent ; moving pictures of the 
kind that make one blush for our Western manners and 
morals in partihis infidelium ; concerts, dances, and 
lectures (the last chiefly by Japanese for Japanese) — 
all winding up with the Captain's farewell dinner, and a 
well-worn speech in English by that worthy mariner. 
As one surrenders oneself to the routine of an existence 
in which everything from bath to bedtime proceeds 
smoothly " according to plan," one begins to realise 
dimly what life must be in Japan under a bureaucratic 
system which is merely the old feudalism slightly modified 
in externals, and which relieves the masses of all necessity, 
or indeed of any opportunity, of thinking for themselves. 

The cost of the journey across the Pacific, of seventeen 
halcyon days' travel, not to mention board and lodging, 
appeared to me, a year ago (no doubt, like everything else, 
it has since gone up), to be one of the few surviving 
instances of value for money on this distressful planet. 
The price of the ticket worked out at about $15 a day, 
which, as times go, seems a very modest sum to pay for 
the privilege of existing, not to speak of being carried 
across six thousand miles of ocean. All the same, unless 
you happen to be a teetotaller, the journey may prove 
expensive in the end, for the American and the Japanese 



ON A JAPANESE PACIFIC LINER 217 

liners have bound themselves by an unholy pact to bleed 
without mercy any man who chooses to season his meat 
with wine or his tobacco with spirits. Talk of profiteering ! 
The cost of a bottle of Scotch whisky in Yokohama is, 
roughly, $i gold; they make you pay $6 for it on the 
Pacific Mail and Japanese boats. Champagne is $io 
(fifty shillings, egad !) a bottle, cocktails two shillings, 
and everything else in proportion. Last spring the Nippon 
Yusen Kaisha paid its shareholders a dividend of 70 
per cent, and a little bonus of 100 per cent. ; since then 
they have announced their intention to raise the rates 
of passenger travel on the ground that the present charges 
do not cover expenses. It may be so — since the war 
company finance has passed far beyond the range of an 
ordinary man's understanding — but whatever the charge 
for the passage may be, one would like, once aboard, to 
be allowed to forget both Pussyfoot and Profiteer. Ex- 
tortion on the high seas rankles worse than on dry land, 
for the reason that there is no possible means of escape. 
The organised efficiency and imitative adaptability of 
the Japanese race of to-day were very clearly reflected 
on board the Shinyo Maru, and to me, returning to the 
East after an absence of ten years, there was something 
very significant and instructive in every fresh manifesta- 
tion of this adaptability, which, in the lifetime of a man, 
has mastered all the material secrets of our Western 
civilisation and most of our parlour tricks as well. As I 
sat in the smoking-room and watched twenty or thirty 
typical Japanese of the class that travels — ^bankers, 
politicians, doctors, merchants, and students — nearly all 
wearing European clothes, and dividing their time 
between games of poker and endless, earnest conversa- 
tions ; as I saw them in the saloon, eating European 
food and placidly enduring the relentless music, I found 
myself continually wondering whether the race-mind is, 
and can be permanently, satisfied with all this alien 
window-dressing? It pleases me rather to think that, 
having proved her ability to acquire the gospel of force, 



218 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

and achieved her place amongst the great Powers, Japan 
will see fit some day to return to her own old gracious 
ways of thinking and living, replacing all these foreign 
tricks and trappings with things seemly and suitable to 
the soul of the people. I like to believe in the possible 
renaissance of the glory that was Old Japan, of her 
people's birthright of sweetness and beauty, of conscious 
joy in simple things, of chivalry and self-control. I like 
to hope for the coming of another Inouye, who shall teach 
Japan to be true to herself and to cease from following 
after strange gods. 

Take, for example, the question of clothes. Can it be 
possible that a race of artists like the Japanese are really 
satisfied with the horrible hybrid appearance of the 
people as at present arrayed? In the case of their 
women-folk, thank goodness, they have come to under- 
stand that to clothe them in European garments is an 
offence which cries aloud to heaven. Do the men really 
fail to realise the utter hideousness and incongruity of 
their own clothes, especially when contrasted with the 
dainty charm of Madam Butterfly, or do they wear these 
reach-me-downs as offerings on the altars of patriotic 
duty? Of all the Japanese passengers aboard the 
Shinyo Maru, there were only two who wore their own 
dignified and comfortable national dress, and both, 
curiously enough, were men who had lived most of their 
days abroad. When you ask a Japanese whether he really 
prefers European clothes, the usual reply is that, for pur- 
poses of travel or office work, they are more convenient 
than native dress. This may be true for the very small 
minority of well-to-do people who can afford a complete 
European outfit, including boots, but the average indi- 
vidual that one sees in the streets of Tokyo or Osaka 
presents an appearance that suggests no idea of con- 
venience. A slouchy bagman's hat or cloth cap, a 
dingy cape overcoat with a fur collar, a shapeless pair 
of trousers — and the West has done its share of a dreadful 
business. The East ends it fittingly with white tahi 



ON A JAPANESE PACIFIC LINER 219 

(stockings) and a pair of high wooden sandals, which 
our friend removes, as of old, whenever he enters a 
tea-house and even when he goes shopping at Mitsu- 
koshi's new department store. 

A nation which has learned to build and man its own 
Pacific hners was bound, I suppose, to get gramophones 
and dress suits and department stores, as part of its 
competitive outfit ; there is even talk, here and there, 
of a movement for adopting some form of Christianity 
as the national religion, on the same principle. In the 
smoking-room of the Shinyo Maru, I frequently discussed 
these things at great length with the member of the Diet 
aforesaid and a rich steel-plate manufacturer from Kobe, 
both men of liberal, not to say radical, views. And in 
the minds of both, beneath their complacent satisfaction 
at Japan's material progress, I found unmistakable signs 
of that which I, too (though only a passer-by), feel and 
fear : apprehension of the perils of change which lie 
beyond. 



CHAPTER XII 

MODERN TOKYO 

** What wonderful changes you must see ! " Here in 
Tokyo, as in Shanghai, when you tell any one that it is 
years since you last visited these parts, the set phrase 
greets you inevitably, a regular shibboleth. Moreover, 
whether it comes from a native or a foreign resident, 
the manner of its utterance clearly implies that you are 
expected to express amazement at the prodigious pro- 
gress which the city has achieved since last you saw it. 
As to the magnitude and multitude of the changes which 
have taken place in Tokyo, there can be neither doubt 
nor discussion ; they confront you at every step. During 
the last ten years the population has increased from 
858,000 to 3,000,000, of whom nearly 300,000 are em- 
ployed in industrial labour. Since 1917 the number of 
factories has increased twofold, the cost of living has 
risen swiftly to the European level, and strikes have 
become a favourite form of recreation amongst all classes 
of manual workers. The chief business districts of the 
city are altered beyond all recognition ; only a few ancient 
landmarks remain, here and there, little islets of stability 
in an ocean of change, to remind one of the tranquil 
Tokyo of bygone days. And far beyond the city limits 
of those days, crowded residential suburbs have sprimg 
up, in places where one remembers seeing little villages 
clustering and rice-fields shimmering in the sun. Where 
once the kuruma ran through quiet little streets to a 
rhythmical accompaniment of the vox humana, the clamour 
of tramcars now resounds, amidst great blocks of build- 
ings in the European style, and motor-cars combine with 

220 



MODERN TOKYO 221 

handcarts, bicycles, and jinrickshas to produce a very 
horrid congestion of traffic. There are now whole streets 
of shops with window displays in the latest foreign style, 
and at the great department stores, like Mitsukoshi's, 
Madame Butterfly and Madame Morning Glory, with their 
babies on their backs, may snatch a fearful and exotic 
joy from electric lifts, moving stairways, and shopping 
to the strains of an alleged Strauss. 

Oh yes, there is no question as to the greatness of the 
changes, and if we cling to the creed of the virtuous 
Victorians, who declared that " progress is the kind of 
improvement which can be measured by statistics," then 
Tokyo has undoubtedly progressed. If (to quote Dean 
Inge) we accept the view that a nation which travels 
sixty miles an hour must be five times as civilised as 
one which travels only twelve, then the capital of Japan 
to-day greatly excels in civilisation the ancient city of 
the Tokugawa Shogunate, of which, nevertheless, the 
poets continue to sing. Whether or not to join in the 
chorus of congratulation which the up-to-date citizen 
evidently expects, must depend upon one's individual 
conception of the meaning of the words " civilisation " 
and " progress." If the ultimate aim of human endeavour 
is to produce a great increase of population, gathered 
together in huge cities, making vast quantities of un- 
necessary things by machinery, with ever-increasing noise 
and haste, so be it : wisdom may yet be justified of her 
children. But for myself, looking as an old friend upon 
Tokyo and other cities of Japan, and remembering the 
many grateful and gracious things which the present-day 
materialism has slowly but surely taken from the daily 
life of these town-dwellers : their simple serenity, their 
old-world virtues of courtesy and kindliness, I confess 
myself unable to derive any comfort from the triumphant 
statistics of their Chambers of Commerce, or any joy from 
the sight of a dozen motor-cars awaiting their top-hatted 
owners at the gates of the Diet. If, as I believe, the first 
aim of a wise civilisation should be to increase the average 



222 CfflNA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

individual's opportunities for rational happiness, then 
the old Japan was nearer to wisdom than the new, if only 
because it had a clearer perception of the things that 
matter, and because its traditions and ideals came nearer 
to the absolute values of Truth and Beauty. In the 
streets of Tokyo to-day, as in Glasgow or Chicago or 
V^ Berlin, the "progress which is measured by statistics" 
has produced, and is producing, material and spiritual 
^gliness. There has been, no doubt, a notable advance 
in the experience and machinery of life, but it is an 
advance not only unaccompanied by any indication of 
increased happiness and morality, but one which reveals 

T itself many symptoms of unrest and discontent. 
As I made my way on February 25 along the 
broad thoroughfare which leads from the Imperial Palace 
walls to the curiously makeshift Houses of Parliament, 
to attend there an obviously make-believe debate on the 
question of universal suffrage, signs of Japan's modernity 
confronted me at every turn. Bronze statues in honour 
of departed warriors and word-spinners, hideous enough, 
in all conscience, to cure most men of any ambition to 
rival their fame; a regiment of infantry on the march, 
all wearing black respirators, supposed to be an effective 
protection against the prevalent influenza; a crowd of 
citizens, mostly of the student class, arrayed in a fearful 
and wonderful motley of native and foreign garments; 
and between them and the Diet, forming a close cordon, 
several hundred policemen, all very brisk and bristly. 
As I watched them keeping the crowd at its proper and 
respectful distance from the approaches to the Diet, 
some imp of irony whispered in my ear a modern closet- 
philosopher's catchword about the New World that was 
to be made free for Democracy, and my mind travelled 
swiftly from the cloud-capped towers of that splendid 
Utopia to the realities of the scene before me. For here 
were the elected, well-paid servants of the sovereign people 
convened in the name of Democracy for solemn discus- 
sion of a matter vitally affecting the people's liberties, 



MODERN TOKYO 223 

and all around and about them, another body of public 
servants, whose duty it was to prevent the said sovereign 
people from coming anywhere near to their faithful 
representatives, lest perchance they might do them an 
injury ! 

Inside the Diet the scene was stately and impressive. 
If only all the members (instead of about half) had worn 
their national dress, it would have been very imposing. 
As a body, the M.P.s were more distinguished-looking 
and dignified than I had been led to expect; compared 
with the raw youths who claim to represent the people 
in China's or Turkey's parliaments pour rire, they gave 
one the impression of being grave and reverend seigniors, 
for their average age appeared to be rather over than 
under forty. All those who held official positions wore 
European dress, for such is the mot d'ordre of the bureau- 
cracy. Most of the Government's contributions to the 
debate, read from carefully-prepared documents, were 
received by the House, if not with respectful attention, at 
least without unseemly interruptions. Even when the 
Prime Minister suddenly produced an Imperial Rescript 
whereby the House found itself dissolved without further 
argument, it preserved its dignity and decorum. But 
for any one who knew the inner history of the universal 
Suffrage Bill and the real sentiments of the Kenseikai 
Radicals on the subject, the whole debate was nothing 
more than a Barmecide feat of political flapdoodle, " the 
stuff that fools are fed with." The proceedings gave 
one, in fact, much the same impression that one gets 
nowadays in the House by the river at Westminster, 
an impression of cynical make-believe, of an elaborate 
farce, well played by highly trained professionals. But 
the entertainment was none the less popular as a spectacle ; 
every seat in the several divisions of the gallery was 
filled. I had a ticket of admission to the place which 
is supposed to be set aside for the Diplomatic Body and 
persons introduced by the Embassies, but found all its 
seats occupied by Japanese, an arrangement in which 



224 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

the policeman in charge evidently saw nothing to com- 
plain of. Having squeezed my way in amongst the 
spectators standing at the back of the box, I asked my 
neighbour, an intelHgent-looking individual in a top 
hat, whether all those in front of us were diplomats. 
" Oh no," he repHed, " they are only trespassers." 

Later on, as I made my way back on foot in the dusk, 
along the broad street which runs past the Foreign Office, 
and thence by the road which skirts the beautiful old 
Palace moat, to the top of the hill where the British Em- 
bassy stands, I came upon a derelict motor-bus, broken- 
down and miserably marooned in a morass of mud. The 
sight of it brought forcibly to mind the fact that although 
Japan has become one of the Big Five, and done many 
other great things since last I saw the streets of Tokyo, 
the present state of those streets and of the public services 
which use them is considerably worse than it was then. 
It is unquestionably true that the roads of Peking are 
now better, both as to construction and maintenance, 
than those of Tokyo ; ten years ago the comparison was 
all the other way. Indeed, the problems of locomotion, 
transport, and communications in the Japanese capital 
have become acute. Their unpleasant results are mani- 
fest in many directions and most noticeably in the restric- 
tion of trade ; nevertheless, neither in Parliament nor in 
the Press is there any evidence of the necessary corrective 
in the shape of an organised public opinion. The distances 
in Tokyo from the business centres to the residential 
suburbs are very great. The tramway services, good 
enough of their kind, are totally inadequate to the needs 
of the present population, and the cost of hiring a jin- 
ricksha (the poor man's carriage of former days) has 
risen to such a height that it is often cheaper for two 
people to hire a taxi than to use the man-drawn vehicle. 
But as there are practically no motors for hire beyond 
the radius of the railway stations and large hotels, 
the average middle-class citizen, who desires to avoid 
struggling for standing room in a tram, either keeps a 



MODERN TOKYO 225 

private jinricksha or a bicycle. For these, in wet weather, 
the state of the roads, ankle deep in mud, is a constant 
affliction. The women of the working classes, unable to 
afford jinricksha hire, have to choose between the chance 
of an overcrowded tram and walking. On all sides one 
hears grievous complaints of the high cost of living, 
which is notably higher in Tokyo than in Yokohama, 
but except in the case of the rice riots of August 1918, 
there has been but little sign of any organised expression 
of public dissatisfaction with the inefficiency of the 
bureaucracy, which is largely responsible for the unsatis- 
factory conditions prevailing in the great industrial 
centres. 

And the state of the roads is only one of many symp- 
toms. In Japan, as in other countries, the demoralisa- 
tion of the postal, telephone, and telegraph services may 
be ascribed, indirectly at least, to the war, because large 
numbers of civil servants have left their posts to seek 
more lucrative employment in factories and offices. But 
after all, Japan was not actually at war, and only bureau- 
cratic inefficiency and dishonesty can account for the 
appalling condition of the public services as they are at 
present all over the country. And nowhere is their 
disorganisation more conspicuous than in and about the 
capital. Even within the city limits telephoning is 
generally a futile waste of time and a weariness of the 
flesh, and if the community has not given it up entirely 
as a bad job, the fact is probably due to the equally 
chaotic state of the postal administration. To get a 
telephone call through to Yokohama, nineteen miles 
away, is generally a matter of two or three hours, but to 
get a reply by post may take days, so that in cases where 
time is money, it is best to send a private messenger 
by train. And to judge by the opinions of business men 
on the spot, these symptoms of official incompetence 
are by no means local or transient, but chronic, and due 
to the apathy and ignorance of a bureaucracy which 
can imitate, but cannot maintain. Western methods, 
Q 



226 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

and to the prevalence of " graft " of super-Tammany 
rapacity. 

I have mentioned the high cost of living. Generally 
speaking, the price of food and other necessities has 
risen more rapidly in Tokyo than in most of the world's 
great cities, a fact which accounts for much of the pre- 
valent social and political unrest, especially as the pressure 
on the poorer classes has been accompanied by the 
emergence of a cjass of new rich, whose ostentatious 
display of war-wealth violates all the national traditions 
of frugality and simplicity. These nankin, with their 
foreign-built houses, their motor-cars, their over-dressed 
women and unseemly manners, have figured more and 
more conspicuously in the life of the capital since 1917, 
and the rice riots of August 1918 showed how greatly 
their extravagances had contributed to create popular 
discontent. The new economic conditions resulting from 
the war are in many respects similar to those in England, 
especially in the case of the unorganised middle class, 
which finds itself impoverished and ignored between the 
profiteers and the proletariat. The rapid growth of the 
new millionaire class may be gauged by the fact that, 
whereas in 1914 there were only twenty-two persons in 
Japan paying income tax on fortunes declared at over 
100,000 yen, in 1918 there were 336, and this despite the 
notorious laxity of the revenue collectors in deaUng with 
big incomes. 

Taking the year 1909 as a basis, with the index figure 
100, the cost of living for bank clerks and other clerical 
workers had risen in 1919 to 320, and is now considerably 
higher; in the same period the incomes had increased 
to 227. In the case of manual labourers, while the cost 
of living had increased at about the same rate, wages 
had risen to 494, or more than twice as much. 

Small wonder that under these conditions the birth-rate 
of the middle class shows a steady decline. The Captain 
of an ocean-going steamer, with whom I travelled, told 
me that in the cities, throughout the whole country. 



MODERN TOKYO 227 

small families are becoming the rule, whereas they used 
to be the exception, amongst the professional and educated 
classes, a direct result of the high cost of living. He 
himself as a boy cost his parents 5 yen a month for 
school and board; his own two children cost 45 yen a 
month each. 

The social results of these conditions are plainly mani- 
fest in many directions. In Tokyo, Osaka, and other 
industrial centres they have produced a ferment of new 
ideas, much political agitation, and, amongst the younger 
Intellectuals, manifestations of a spirit of iconoclasm and 
resistance to parental authority which, in the opinion 
of some observers, points to a weakening of the family 
system, upon which the whole social fabric is founded. 
Those who look chiefly to the surface phenomena of life, 
as they see it in the chief cities of Japan, can find evidence, 
no doubt, in support of this view. They can point, for 
example, to the growth of the movement for the emanci- 
pation of women, to the rapid increase of strikes, and the 
wave of sentiment in support of Labour Unions, to the 
demand for Universal Suffrage, and to many other things 
that would have been impossible twenty years ago. But 
they err, I think, in concluding from these premises and 
from the rapid development of industrialism that the 
whole social structure of the nation is imperilled ; for 
they overlook the important truth that the great majority 
of the people are agricultural, indifferent to politics, and 
firmly rooted in the customs and beliefs that have sprung 
from the family system, with all its traditions of loyalty, 
simple faith, and discipline. More than half the families 
which constitute the Japanese nation are tillers of the 
soil ; it is they, and not the two million factory workers, 
who truly represent the abiding strength of the race — • 
silent depths unmoved by all the waves of words that 
sound so loud in the ears of the city-dwellers. I believe 
that the structure of society in Japan, as in China, broad- 
based upon the family system and all that it implies of 
veneration for the past, will enable the nation to stand 



228 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

and survive the economic strain of competitive indus- 
trialism. 

Even in Tokyo, beneath the froth and foam of unrest 
on the surface, there is evidence that the solidarity of 
the family system is producing a reaction against the 
exotic Westernism and Radicalism of the Intellectuals 
and other restless followers after new and strange gods. 
To any one who has not visited Japan for several years, 
the signs of this reaction are unmistakable and significant. 
Throughout all classes of society, even amongst the 
factory workers, there are symptoms of a healthy revival 
of conscious and confident nationalism, of a tendency 
to cultivate the indigenous rather than the exotic, to be 
naturally and frankly Japanese, rather than to imitate 
the European. The bureaucracy in office hours still 
exhibits in its clothing, equipment, and manners its 
deference to an alien civilisation, but in its home life, 
and even at the Tokyo Club, officialdom displays its 
preference for native clothes and native food. I have 
seen two elderly diplomats, men with distinguished 
records as Ambassadors, playing billiards at the Tokyo 
Club, both wearing Japanese dress ; and at the crowded 
Christmas reception given by the Imperial Hotel, very 
few of the guests wore foreign clothes. Most Japanese 
of the upper classes, especially those who have been 
educated abroad, will tell you that they find trousers 
more convenient for office use and exercise than the native 
kimono, but at home they prefer the latter. They 
might add that, in addition to being more comfortable, 
it is infinitely more dignified and becoming, especially 
as, for reasons which remain mysterious, even the richest 
of the ultra-modern Japanese in foreign clothes always 
give one the impression that they have bought them 
ready-made and never troubled about their fit. 

But the most significant manifestation of the reaction 
against Western influences is to be found in art and 
religion, in the restoration of many ancient customs 
and ceremonials, things beautiful and venerable by virtue 



MODERN TOKYO 229 

of immemorial usage, which fell for a while into disrepute, 
observed only by the faithful, when, with the end of the 
Shogunate, the nation became seized with a craze for 
foreign ways and foreign ideas. In those days the 
classical drama and many a national shrine were neg- 
lected of the people, native arts and crafts languished 
whilst the nation struggled to fashion its mind and its 
manners on those of another race, sacrificing in the pro- 
cess much of its natural distinction and dignity. But 
the flowing tide of that delusion has now ebbed, and 
to-day the ancient rites and ceremonials are observed 
with renewed fervour, and the Way of the Gods appeals 
to the race-mind as of old. Particularly notable is the 
widespread revival of the ancient classical NO dances, 
instinct with all the stateliness, grace, and poetry of 
Japanese culture. The warmth of the welcome extended 
by all classes to this revival is a very remarkable sign 
of the times. It would seem to indicate a genuine 
renaissance rather than a spasmodic reaction, and at 
the same time to afford evidence of the permanent 
stability of the national conception of life which has 
grown with, and out of, the family system. To witness 
a performance of the NO dances and observe the almost 
religious devotion of the audience, is an experience which 
makes one feel that the nankin and all his works and 
ways are but an " unsubstantial pageant " which will 
fade with all his gorgeous palaces, and " leave not a rack 
behind." Before he and his motor-cars can fit into the 
scheme of things Japanese, this land of men and things 
harmoniously adjusted to its own small but exquisite 
scale, will have to be shattered and reconstructed. 
Tokyo's modern thoroughfares, lined with European 
buildings, filled with the clamour of tramways and the 
smell of bad petrol, are a necessary evil, like the diplomat's 
top-hat — Dai Nippon's price of Admiralty; but they 
are not, and never will be, the real Japan. 



CHAPTER XIII 

AT A JAPANESE THEATRE 

A GREY afternoon in February, with a driving rain 
and a cold wind which blows in sudden gusts from the 
four quarters of heaven. A little musume, coming down 
a side lane, is making heavy weather of it, her kimono 
close tucked about her knees and her body bending 
shakily to the squalls behind her oiled-paper umbrella. 
The mud lies so deep in the narrow thoroughfare that 
it comes at times above the level of her high-tilted wooden 
clogs, leaving its mark upon her white socks. Tokyo in 
winter knows many such days; you may get an idea 
from Hokusai's pictures of their bleakness, and of their 
effect upon the human atom. In this street of the Kabuki 
Theatre, on a day like this, one's thoughts go wandering 
back to the old Japan, that one knew and loved thirty 
years ago, before the days of trams and trains, because 
it is a quiet, old-fashioned street, remote from the bustling 
modernity of Tokyo's commercial centres. No tramway 
lines run through it, and motor-cars are scarce ; 'tis a 
street that suggests the dignity of an individuality pre- 
served, and worth preserving, wisely aloof from the 
crowd that follows the cheap] ack vendor of novelties. 
As our rickshas make their heavy way through the mud, 
with hoods and side-flaps battened down, and swaying 
in the wind, one catches glimpses of bamboos and cedars 
amidst high walls and latticed balconies : little moving 
pictures, all framed in grey, that stir the mind to dreams 
of adventure and romance. For behind these walls are 
some of the most fashionable tea-houses of Tokyo, 

230 




UTAYEMON AND FUKUSUKE (FATHER AND 



AT A JAPANESE THEATRE 231 

patronised alike by patricians and by profiteers, and 
frequented by the daintiest damsels of the Geisha world. 

The entrance to the theatre is in keeping with its 
surroundings — ^unobtrusive, but impressive by virtue 
of its native simplicity and the sense of fitness displayed 
in its decoration. Here is no meretricious display, no 
glaring effect of electric lighting or gaudy posters, but 
a little open court or vestibule, level with the street, where 
the audience leaves its clogs or boots, all neatly ticketed 
in rows ; and behind it, decorated with painted screens 
and lanterns, a narrow corridor, carpeted with white 
matting, that leads directly into the body of the theatre, 
or, as we should call it, the pit. Inside, the house is 
much larger than its exterior would have led one to expect, 
and here, again, one is impressed by the artistic restraint 
and harmony of the decorative scheme, with its plain 
gilded ceiling and graceful carving. All around the gallery 
hang ornamental paper lanterns that soften the glare of 
the electric light ; if the hieroglyphics painted on their 
sides are the advertisement of a face-powder, the fact 
is pleasantly unobtrusive. The stage is long and wide, 
and the flies, hung low, add to the impression of its depth ; 
the scenery is extremely effective, conforming always 
to the classical conventions, rich without gaudiness, 
beautiful in its ensemble and colouring, and, to the 
initiated, intensely significant in its details. 

In the body of the house are the boxes — little squares 
partitioned off from each other, where four or five persons 
can squat comfortably in the Oriental manner and leave 
room in their midst for the charcoal brazier and a tray with 
cups for tea or cake. These are the best and most expen- 
sive seats in the house ; here you may see Tokyo, both 
en famille and en gargon, enjoying itself thoroughly and 
at its leisure. For the performance at the Kabuki, 
consisting generally of three or four plays, begins at one 
o'clock in the afternoon and lasts till about ten. There 
are intervals of twenty-five minutes between each play, 
during which the audience either consumes its own 



232 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

miscellaneous refreshments or repairs to the restaurant 
on the upper floor, where meals are served both in the 
European and the native style. 

The stage is more popular in Japan to-day, and takes 
itself more seriously, than at any time in the past fifty 
years. Ten years ago most of the play-houses of Tokyo 
were struggling for a bare existence, and many of the best 
actors played to half -empty houses. To-day, despite the 
new attraction of the cinema, every theatre is crowded, 
and enterprising managers are planning new and larger 
buildings in several cities, while the salaries of popular 
favourites have soared to figures hitherto unknown. 
The change is due partly to the increased earnings of the 
working classes and the general prosperity created by the 
war, and partly, no doubt, to a general restlessness and 
hunger for amusement, signs of the disjointed times, as 
conspicuous in Japan as in other parts of the world. In 
Tokyo the phenomenon is also explained by the rapid 
growth of the city's population, and by the fact that a 
large number of its three million inhabitants are industrial 
workers, for whom the theatre provides a welcome relief 
from the monotony of mechanical labour. 

But of all the theatres in Japan there is none so secure 
in the intelligent appreciation of the people as this home 
of the classical national drama, nor have any of the 
brilliant young players of the younger generation achieved 
the same high place in the loyal affection of the public 
as the veteran actors of the Kabuki-za. The fact speaks 
well, I think, both for the public and the players, because 
all the aspirations and achievements of such popular 
idols as Nakamura Utayemon and Ichikawa Chusha are 
based upon an unswerving tradition of high seriousness, 
upon fidelity to national ideals, and preservation of the 
classical style, the great inheritance of the Yedo school. 
On the day of my visit to the Kabuki, the usual " house 
full " notice was up, in spite of the weather, before two 
o'clock ; not even in the gallery was there standing room. 
Of the three plays on the programme one was a ghost 



AT A JAPANESE THEATRE 233 

tale, the second a drama based on the well-worn theme 
of a retainer's loyalty to his feudal chief, and the third 
a historical play — " Benke," the tragic love story of a 
priest who became a great warrior. Throughout all 
three the note of high seriousness was consistently sus- 
tained, together with an amazing harmony of effect, 
down to the minutest details of stagecraft and a subtle 
sense of perfection such as Art can only give at its highest 
pitch of intensive culture. As I sat absorbed in the weird, 
insidious beauty of the ghost play, wondering at the grace 
and dignity with which Utayemon (now over sixty years 
of age) played the young woman's part, and the dehcate 
concordance of scenery and music with the innermost 
spirit of the drama, my mind went back to the day, more 
than thirty years ago, when for the first time I saw Danjuro 
the ninth — when, without understanding the language, 
I learned to appreciate the fine flower of dramatic art, 
which generations of great players have brought to such 
perfection in Japan. The style and methods of the great 
Danjuro are a tradition and a living force on the Tokyo 
stage to-day, jealously preserved by his two famous pupils, 
Ichikawa Danshiro and Ichikawa Chusha, and by them 
faithfully handed down to the rising stars of the next 
generation. There is something of almost rehgious devo- 
tion in the attitude of these great actors towards the 
classical traditions of their profession and in the relations 
which exist between masters and pupils of the craft. 
In many instances, notably those of Nakamura Utayemon 
and Ichikawa Danshiro, the tradition passes direct from 
father to son in an atmosphere of discipline and fihal piety 
like that of Chinese scholars of the golden age of learning 
and their disciples. 

There are no women on the boards of the Kabuki 
Theatre, for mixed companies are forbidden by the laws 
of the classical drama. Of the great women impersonators 
(Onnagata) — each marvellous in his way — ^the most famous 
are Nakamura Utayemon, above mentioned, his son 
Fukusuke, and Onoe Baiko, who specialises in the weird 



234 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

at the Imperial. To see Utayemon and his son playing 
the parts of mother and daughter in a great drama like 
" Benke "is an experience well worth a month's journey. 
The father is probably the most idolised actor on the 
Japanese stage to-day, and when he takes the part of 
the youthful heroine of a popular play like " Nijushiko," 
the house (undemonstrative, as a rule, compared to 
European audiences) resounds with cries of " Nippon 
ichi " (first in Japan). You will hear the same at Osaka, 
where Ganjiro is playing — Ganjiro, the idol of the great 
industrial city of the west — for Japanese playgoers are 
fervent partisans, and there has always been keen rivalry 
between the two cities.. 

By means of an introduction from a personal friend 
of Utayemon, and by the courtesy of the management, 
I was privileged to visit the chief performers in their 
dressing-rooms, and to see something of the actors' life 
and business behind the scenes. The most striking feature 
of the stage and all its appurtenances was the scrupulous 
tidiness and cleanliness of everything and every one 
connected with it. No sign of the mild disorder, the 
genial confusion with which the artistic temperament 
is wont to reveal itself in and about the green-rooms of 
European theatres ; on the contrary, there was a place 
for everything and everything in its place, from the 
common wardrobe of the humble supers to the elaborate 
equipment of the principals' wigmaker's room. And 
withal an amplitude of elbow-room sufficient to allow 
a generous measure of privacy. As I sat in Utayemon's 
dressing-room, I wondered what the principal villain 
or the leading lady at Drury Lane would think of this 
dainty boudoir ^ I'Orientale, with its sliding panels and 
its spotless floor of white matting, its classically chaste 
decoration of flowers and kakemono appropriate to the 
season, and its beautiful little shrine in a secluded alcove, 
where father and son invoke their kindly gods and offer 
their thanksgiving for success. On the wall, opposite 
the shrine, in a long row, were the black envelopes in 



AT A JAPANESE THEATRE 235 

which the management conveys its congratulations and 
a little gift to each " star " to commemorate a "house 
full " performance. (Every member of the company 
receives one of these graceful mementos ; for the lesser 
lights it takes the form of a " red letter " enclosing 
a five sen piece.) While I sat and talked to Utayemon, 
Fukusuke was having a new wig tried on by one of the 
soft -footed dressers ; very pleasant and touching it was 
to see the father's unaffected pride in his already-famous 
son, and the latter's deferential courtesy. 

An exacting business is the profession of the Onnagata, 
entailing, as it does, the unceasing effort of a voice high- 
pitched and artificially strained. Utayemon, like many 
other female impersonators, suffers from a mild form of 
paralysis or numbness of the limbs, brought about by 
the use of arsenical white paint, lavishly applied to produce 
the necessary female pallor. But considering his age, he 
bears his years of strenuous work very lightly, preserv- 
ing a youthful vivacity of mind that seems to defy the 
hand of Time. He has the keen, mobile features, the 
gracefully eloquent movements of the unmistakable 
born actor ; temperate in his habits, intensely serious in 
his profession, addicted in his hours of leisure to painting 
and music, he displays in conversation a philosophic 
dignity, combined with genial humour, which reminded 
me of the elder Guitry. 

Most of the leading actors in Japan, as in other countries, 
are lavish with their money and given to extravagant 
display; most of them, by common report, are heavily 
in debt. By the same report Utayemon is the one excep- 
tion to the rule, avoiding the notoriety conferred by 
the fashionable intelligence columns of the Tokyo Press. 
The etiquette which obtains in the dramatic profession 
all over the world, whereby the amount of a player's 
remuneration remains a confidential matter between him 
(or her) and the management, prevails also in Japan, so 
that it is difficult to speak positively as to the salaries 
earned by the stars of the Tokyo stage, but in the case 



236 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

of Utayemon, admittedly the best paid, it appears to be 
generally understood that he receives ten thousand yen 
(say £1200) a month. As a full house at the Kabuki, 
according to the Manager, means about five thousand 
yen, this seems a high figure. But there are Chinese 
comedians playing in the big native theatres at Shanghai 
who draw higher salaries than this. 

The custom of Japanese theatres is to give their per- 
formances continuously for twenty-five days in each 
month, and to close for the other five or six days. When 
a company has done its nine or ten hours a day (they 
also serve who dnly stand and wait) for twenty-five days, 
it has well earned a rest. It is in this holiday season 
at the end of each month that the prodigals of the pro- 
fession play ducks and drakes with their money, repaying 
by sumptuous entertainments the generosity of their 
special patrons and the zealous devotion of their Geisha 
admirers. It is often a case of Do ut des. Every popular 
actor has his own following of faithful admirers, and a 
Geisha whose society is much sought after in the world 
of " big business " or high politics can do a great deal 
for the object of her affections by persuading her 
" narikin " friends to give theatre parties in his honour. 
A Japanese actor's pay is generally dependent upon his 
popularity, and he whose Geisha admirers bring most 
ticket-buyers to the box office draws salary accordingly. 
When, in return, the popular favourite invites his patrons 
to entertainments at fashionable tea-houses, his Geisha 
friends reap their harvest of golden opportunity. As a 
native journalist put it, when explaining the intricacies 
of these sentimental business relations, a " narikin " 
will spend fabulous sums to win from a famous Geisha 
even that " semblance of affection " which makes him 
the talk of the town and a conspicuous figure in Tokyo's 
Vanity Fair. Many stage-struck Geishas wear the crests 
of their favourite actors on their kimonos and handker- 
chiefs — a form of hero-worship which is not confined to 
the professional entertainers. On the upper floor of the 




B. T. Prideaux] 



THEATRE STREET IN KYOTO. 



AT A JAPANESE THEATRE 237 

theatre, near the restaurant, there are a number of httle 
shops and booths, where various kinds of " fairings " and 
souvenirs are to be bought — pouches, photographs, 
handkerchiefs, and hair ornaments — all bearing the crest 
of one or other of the chief actors; these do a roaring 
trade with the sentimental and susceptible young ladies 
of the bourgeoisie. My friend the native journalist afore- 
said, moralising on these matters, delivered himself of 
one of those quaintly platitudinous truths in which his 
class delights. " An actor's wife," he said, " must have 
much social cleverness. She must be broad-minded, 
of equable temper, and never jealous." Even so. 

As compared with the drama in other lands, a popular 
play in Japan calls for a good deal of bloodletting. The 
public insists on scenes that will make its flesh creep, 
and as it does not creep too easily, the agony has to be 
long-drawn-out and emphasised with much gruesome 
and highly realistic detail. In the three plays which we 
saw at the Kabuki, there were three killings and two 
blood-curdling cases of hara-kiri, and in the latter the 
victims took an unconscionable time in dying. Most 
of these popular dramas are tales of old Japan, illustrating 
and exalting the glories of the ancient Samurai, the 
virtues of filial piety, of Spartan courage, and unquestion- 
ing loyalty to the feudal lord. Others are founded on 
some of the innumerable legends, with which Japanese 
literature abounds, that deal with the supernatural and 
the weird — tales of ghosts and goblins, of fox-wives, 
witches, and other ghostly visitants. In the production 
of the atmosphere of uncanny illusion necessary to make 
such plays effective, Japanese stagecraft has attained to 
a wonderful perfection; music, scenery, and acting are 
all so artistically combined to create a subtly convincing 
background, that the weirdest of weird tales becomes 
easily credible. I do not remember to have experienced 
in any European theatre anything like the sense of con- 
vincing illusion as that produced by the presentation 
of the ghost of a murdered wife in one of these plays at 



238 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

the Kabuki. It was illusion of the elemental yet effective 
kind devised by Bottom the Weaver for the presentation 
of Moonshine and Thisbe's wall, produced by the creation 
of a receptive state of mind in the audience, rather than 
by elaboration of stage properties and effects. It requires 
illusion of no ordinary kind to induce unconscious accept- 
ance of the convention that an able-bodied super is in- 
visible because he is dressed in black. But as a matter of 
fact the audience does overlook his presence on the stage, 
or accepts it as part of the natural order of things super- 
natural, even when one of these sable-robed mutes comes 
on, in the middle of a most intensely tragic scene, and 
helps the expiring heroine to die gracefully by putting 
a cushion under her neck. I remember long ago a per- 
formance in which the great Danjuro was bidding farewell 
to his native shores from the stern of a swift-sailing boat. 
The illusion of movement was produced partly by a fast- 
revolving back cloth and partly by supers rocking the 
boat fore and aft from the depths of a canvas sea. In 
the midst of Danjuro 's most impassioned speech, one of 
the waves beneath him burst, exposing a coolie's head 
and shoulders ; but so far as the audience was concerned, 
the thing might never have happened. There was 
certainly no laughter. 

On the Japanese stage, music plays a very important 
part in leading the audience to that state of mind which 
dwells willingly in the haunted house of Illusion. As 
in the art of the scene-painter, many of its results are 
produced by the help of time-honoured conventions, 
with which every Japanese is familiar and whose very 
ancientry makes them the more effective. For certain 
plays — ^notably those which deal with the weird and un- 
earthly — the musicians are concealed behind a bamboo 
screen in the box on the left front of the stage ; for others 
they sit on a platform at the front of the box, and when 
thus visible, wear their old costumes of Daimio days. 
Their part in a performance often resembles that of the 
chorus in a Greek play. In many effective scenes of 



AT A JAPANESE THEATRE 239 

the national classical drama, part of the tale is told in a 
high-pitched recitative (like that of Europe's troubadours) 
by one of the musicians, whilst the actor illustrates the 
story in dumb show; the whole is punctuated by single 
notes of the samisen, strangely appropriate and significant. 
Or again, the actor tells the story, into which at intervals 
the samisen interpolates its impressive keynote. All 
the music used by these players at the Kabuki has been 
handed down, unwritten, from one generation to another, 
and the work of the samisen player and singers is occasion- 
ally supplemented by very telling effects of drums and 
bells off stage. Fully to appreciate their artistic signifi- 
cance one must understand something of the inevitable 
association of ideas which they evoke in the mind of the 
audience. One must know, for example, that just as 
the willow design, applied to a decorative scheme, is con- 
ventionally associated in the Japanese mind with the 
coming of ghosts, so certain solo notes on the flute convey 
the idea of impending doom, and a single note of a temple 
bell implies the very presence of Death. 

In every land the mind of the masses is readily hyp- 
notised by suggestions based on deep-rooted conventions 
and superstitions, but nowhere has knowledge of this 
truth been so skilfully adapted to the purposes of stage- 
craft as in Japan. 



CHAPTER XIV 

A DAY IN SEOUL 

Pre-eminently amongst the cities of the ancient East, 
Seoul is a sermon in stones, which the stranger within 
its gates may read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest. 
I know of none which teaches more forcibly the old, 
old lesson of the sins of the fathers, or which suggests 
such inevitable reflections concerning the mysterious 
forces that form the character and mould the destinies 
of nations. The Imperial City at Peking tells its own 
impressive tale of splendid isolation and departed great- 
ness, but China is still mistress in her own house, and 
though her present state political be rotten, it does not 
carry the same conviction of utter helplessness, of dignity 
pathetic in irretrievable adversity, as that which impresses 
itself upon one in Korea. There is something in the 
very sadness and silence of this white-robed race of 
passive resisters, something in the stoic dignity of their 
monuments and men, which compels our instinctive 
sympathy and respect; and yet, when all is said and 
done, the problem of self-determination for Korea remains, 
humanly speaking, as far removed from solution as the 
federation of the world and the brotherhood of man. 

Chaperoned by the courteous secretary of the South 
Manchurian Railway (a kindly soul, addicted to scholarly 
researches in orthodox Buddhism), I saw the sights of 
modern Seoul and compared it in my mind with the city 
as I knew it long ago, before Japan had forced China to 
abandon her suzerainty over the Hermit Kingdom, and 
again later, before the Russo-Japanese War, when the 
Korean King assumed the title of Emperor, and, for a 
breathing-space of ten years, the country was free to 
manage its own affairs. I remembered how, in 1898, 

240 



A DAY IN SEOUL 241 

the people had demonstrated their discontent with their 
own rulers, sitting silent in their thousands before the 
Palace day and night for fourteen days. I remembered, 
too, that when Japan fought, first China and then Russia, 
for supremacy in the peninsula, the attitude of these 
dogged conscientious objectors was ever that of uncon- 
cerned spectators. Remembering these things, one under- 
stands something of the nature of the tragedy of Korea, 
the pitiful destiny of a people too proud to fight, whose 
home is the strategic keyland of North-Eastern Asia, and 
a predestined bone of contention between the Powers 
that struggle for the mastery of the Pacific. 

As I stood in the great Audience Hall of the old 
Palace, untenanted now and open to the winds of heaven, 
yet splendid in decay, and called to mind the history of 
this people since those far-off days when Korea aspired 
to lead the East in art and learning; as I looked out 
upon the triumphs of incongruous modernity with which 
Japan has decked the hill-girt city (her banks and bar- 
racks, her hospitals and huge hotels), dominating, like 
alien giants, the clustering hovels of the native-born, it 
seemed to me that this empty Audience Hall fittingly 
typified the last scene in a drama of inevitable destiny. 

They showed me the " Government General Museum," 
housed in the ancient and venerable precincts of the 
Palace ; also the delectable pleasaunce and rustic retreat 
which has been set apart for the use and behoof of 
Prince Yi, further consoled for the loss of his Throne 
by a lieutenancy in the Japanese Army and the hand 
of a beautiful Japanese Princess. I saw the preparations 
for His Highness's wedding (that ill-omened marriage ^ of 
which the people speak in whispers) — furniture and em- 
broidery and bowls of silver being made by native 
workers under the direction of Japanese craftsmen. They 
showed me model schools, where Korean boys and girls 
are being taught to look upon Japan as their spiritual 

» It has since taken place, " according to plan," and judging by 
Press reports, husband and wife are doing well. 
R 



242 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

home, and many other cogwheels in the ingeniously 
devised machinery of assimilation. But in all the high- 
ways and byways of the city I saw evidence of the 
dogged conservatism of the race, and proof of the 
fact, which the Japanese themselves are beginning to 
appreciate, that this very policy of assimilation has 
breathed a new spirit of life into the passive resistance 
of the Koreans and aroused in them a strong, though 
still non-combatant, ardour of nationalism. They may 
bow to the presence of the alien invader, they may 
even admit that his progressive administration has in- 
creased the material prosperity of their country, but they 
firmly decline to admit the superiority of Japan's intel- 
lectual and moral culture, they refuse to be assimilated, 
and their refusal has assumed the force of a conscious 
national movement. The problem of Korea, you perceive, 
is very similar to the problem of Ireland. 

Despite its recent trials and tribulations, despite the 
strong hand of a ruler that respects neither topknots nor 
tutelary gods, old Seoul still preserves the philosophic 
dignity which is the birthright of the Land of the Morning 
\ Calm. Here, as elsewhere in the East, one may note 
V/the disastrous results of putting new wine into old 
bottles ; uncouth new clothes and unpleasant new man- 
ners, imported from the West, strike the same discordant 
note in Seoul as they do in Tokyo and Peking. But 
these things are exotic and transient; they have no 
roots in the real life of the nation. The soul of the 
Korean people, like that of the Chinese, stands steadfast 
in the ancient ways, deep-rooted in its own ancestral 
beliefs, and contrives withal to preserve a certain stoic 
kind of geniality. It is a race of husbandmen that 
has eaten too often of the bread of affliction to allow 
itself to be provoked to desperation. It is, no doubt, 
often slothful in business, over -prone to politics and 
plottings, much given to strong drink; but you have 
only to observe the placidly-determined faces of these 
straight-backed men — especially the elders of the people — 



A DAY IN SEOUL 243 

and their confident gait, to realise that here still waters 
run deep. And it is not only on the faces of the men 
that you discern something of the difficulty of the 
problem which Japan has to solve in Korea ; as a passive 
resister, the female of the species is more deadly than 
the male. I caught a glimpse of this truth, subtle and 
significant, at a private performance of Korean Geisha 
given by my Japanese hosts. 

It was after an informal dinner at the residence of the 
Civil Governor, Dr. Midzuno, that one of his secretaries 
(possibly realising that the thread of our political con- 
versation was wearing rather thin) suggested a visit to 
the Taisho Kemba, a high-class Geisha entertainment 
under Japanese management or " control." Never having 
seen Korean Geishas dance, I welcomed the opportunity ; 
and so we left unsolved the problems of militarism in 
high places, of self-determination and the League of 
Nations, and speedily found ourselves driving in His 
Excellency's comfortable motor-car through the silent 
streets of old Seoul. We alighted at the entrance to a 
narrow alle3Avay, running darkly between mud huts, that 
brought to mind the purlieus of the old Chien Men quarter 
in the shadow of the city wall at Peking. 

There was something furtive, almost sinister, in this 
approach to a reputed shrine of Korean musical and 
dramatic culture : not a light shone, not a voice sounded 
from any of the squalid houses past which we groped 
our way. We, too, moved silently, for the snow lay 
deep between these close-built walls. Finally, turning 
the comer of a house which, in the darkness, looked 
like all the rest, we came to a door over which a flickering 
lantern hung ; here our guide knocked, a bolt was drawn, 
and we passed from the bitterly cold night into a long, 
narrow room, furnished at one end with charcoal braziers 
and chairs for the audience, and as to the rest, fitted 
for the dance with soft, clean matting and si ding panels 
a la Japonaise. 

The honours were done by the Japanese manager or 



244 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

impresario of the Geisha administration ; except the per- 
formers and two attendants, no Koreans were present. 
There were six dancers, girls still in their teens, said to 
be the fine flower of Seoul geishadom. They wore the 
elaborate headgear, the quaintly stiff but comely cos- 
tumes of old Korea — high -girdled waists and voluminous, 
many-coloured skirts — and they danced slow and stately 
measures, with flawless precision, to the sound of samisen 
and drum, dances intended to symbolise either the poetry 
of Nature or some episode of legendary romance. Their 
conventionally painted faces, like those of all Oriental 
dancers, were as masks, all cast in the same mould of 
sphinx-like inscrutability, but as women they lacked the 
little airs and graces, the butterfly daintiness and spon- 
taneous gaiety of the Japanese singing-girl. Indeed, as 
entertainers, they were distinctly heavy, and when, 
between the dances, they came, as in duty bound, to 
chat with their guests and drink a cup of sakS, they 
did it perfunctorily and with a courtesy so studied that 
it became oppressive. Not theirs the bird-like chatter 
and light-hearted laughter with which the geisha of 
Tokyo entertain their guests. 1 1 

Our friend the secretary ascribed the solemnity of the 
proceedings to the reticent stolidity which is natural to 
the Koreans, but to me it seemed — and I saw several 
incidents and gestures to confirm the impression — ^that 
these daughters of the Land of the Morning Calm were 
not so much on their dignity as on the defensive, and 
that behind these inscrutable masks there lurked the 
soul of a race whose patriotism drinks deep at the well 
of memories and dreams. As we walked back to the 
most sumptuous hotel in the Far East (a very fine piece 
of window-dressing) I asked one oi our hosts if these 
women never smiled ? " Oh, I think so," he repHed, 
" but not so much with strangers." 

It will take some time* and tact, methinks, to assimilate 
a people whose dancing-girls decline to smile for the 
invader. 



CHAPTER XV 

SHANGHAI 

He who returns to the East after a long absence should 
find something of the freshness and keenness of his first 
impressions, enhanced by an improved sense of pro- 
portion and relative values. Long residence in China 
is apt, I think, to make one take for granted many 
beautiful and satisfying things. FamiUarity, and the 
cares that infest the day, combine to dim one's sense of 
the philosophic dignity inherent in all the East's con- 
ception of life and death and in its time-defying institu- 
tions. The thorns that spring up conceal from us the 
splendid proportions, the enduring strength, of that which, 
say what we will, is by far the noblest monument of 
human wisdom that has come down to us from the wreck- 
strewn past. Amidst the clamour of the money-changers 
and the nostrum vendors of the Treaty Ports, where 
East and West ahke forget the things that matter in their 
swift pursuit of gain, one often loses sight of the profound 
significance of China's moral civihsation. Amidst the 
froth and foam of the breakers, we forget the deep, un- 
ruffled spaces of the sea. And because of our restlessness 
and the haunting memory of our Western birthright, we 
often depreciate, when we live amongst them, the 
thoughts and ways of these old-world children of the 
East. But when one has left China behind for some 
years, and dwelt in the market-places of the West's 
triumphant civilisation, when one has seen that civihsa- 
tion reduced to a welter of scientific slaughter and red 
ruin, one begins to perceive far more clearly than before, 
the value of that system of moral philosophy which is 
the very breath of hfe to the Chinese, and which has 

245 



246 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

preserved this ancient race, if not from attack, at least 
from disruption. One is then perforce compelled to face 
the question whether, as the world stands to-day, it is 
not an impertinence and a waste of time for us to continue 
to urge the Chinese to forsake the teachings of their Sages 
and to believe in the moral superiority of a system which 
ends in Armageddon ? And when one returns to China, 
and finds this patient people, a quarter of the earth's 
inhabitants, pursuing its steadfast way along the lines 
prescribed by centuries of experience and immemorial 
tradition, and achieving, in spite of new perplexities and 
perils, a degree of stability which Europe may well envy, 
one comes to regard the East's non-militant type of 
civilisation in a new Hght and its results in clearer 
perspective. 

There can be, I think, no escape from the conclusion 
that, in the broad conception of life, and in the social 
and political systems which arise out of that conception, 
" East is East and West is West, and never the twain 
shall meet." Between the creative ideas of East and 
West there lies a gulf of elemental difference, which 
neither Time nor any tide in the affairs of men can bridge. 
Considering Asia and its philosophy as a whole, dis- 
regarding its intellectual half-breeds (those brilliant 
dragon-flies of a brief day, that flit erratically across the 
depths of national life), we may confidently ascribe this 
difference to the hold which the patriarchal family 
system of morals and politics has acquired over the race- 
mind of the East, and to the peculiar virtues and defects 
produced in the masses by that system. But let the 
fundamental causes of that difference be what they may, 
deep-buried in the past, its general result has been to 
produce in the Asiatic mind a deep reverence for the 
absolute and the universal, which revolts instinctively 
from the materialism of the West. Ex Oriente lux. It is 
not for nothing that from the East has come every 
religion which has elevated and comforted the hearts of 
men, for the East has always held firmly to the belief 



SHANGHAI 247 

that the means of existence are less important than its 
ends. The masses of the people in China and Japan are 
unconsciously nearer to the spirit of the Sermon on the 
Mount than many of the Christian communities in 
Europe and America which subscribe to send missionaries 
to the East. Can any one deny that the forceful in- 
dividuahsm, upon which are based the social progress 
and material prosperity of Europe and America, is morally 
inferior to the family system of Asia, in which the interests 
of the individual are sacrificed to those of the community ? 
It is the birthright and the instinct of the Anglo-Saxon 
to respect an active, self-helping race and to despise the 
passive non-resister ; but from the Asiatic point of view, it 
is not only a text, but an absolute truth, that the meek 
shall inherit the earth. Your Chinese educated in Mission 
Schools may wear a top-hat and profess to admire our 
many inventions, but the attitude of the East as a whole 
towards our material civiUsation is just as disdainful 
to-day as it was in the days of the Great Mogul. As for me, 
returning to the East from lands wherein all our triumphs 
of mechanical ingenuity have been turned to purposes of 
manslaughter, I find myself more than ever compelled 
to accept and respect the Oriental conception of fife — ^that 
attitude, founded on the wisdom of the ancients, which 
has given to their form of civihsation a stabihty and 
harmony such as our modern world has never known. 
The philosophy of the Chinese is the birthright, not of an 
intellectual elite (as with us), but of the race; it has 
taught them that even wealth is only a means to a rational 
end, that the secret of human happiness lies rather in 
being- than doing, and that, in this unsubstantial pageant 
of illusions, the spirit is more than the flesh. Thus 
regarded, all the fitful fever of Europe's social system, 
all the triumphs of our industrial organisation, are but 
the dead sea fruits of purblind error. From the Eastern 
point of view, 

"The world is too much with us; late and soon, 
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers," 



248 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

and a civilisation which leaves neither time nor place 
for meditation, stands, by that very fact, condemned. 
Despite the burden of physical suffering, the hunger 
and the squalor imposed upon countless millions of 
Asiatics by their passivity, and by the intensity of the 
struggle for survival, accentuated by their procreative 
recklessness, I hold that the East is wiser and better 
than the West. I beUeve that the social institutions 
which have grown out of the Chinese philosophy are 
nearer to the truth, and therefore morally superior to 
our own; and, believing this, I ask myself upon what 
grounds, and to what purpose, do we persist in endeavour- 
ing to impose upon them, not only our mechanical 
inventions, but our political panaceas and our conflicting 
creeds ? 

Shanghai inevitably suggests some such train of thought, 
because here, within the narrow boundaries of the Treaty 
Port, East and West have met on neutral ground and 
held close converse together for seventy years; yet, in 
all things that are essential to human intercourse, they 
remain worlds apart. Some 800,000 Chinese have their 
being within the borders of the Model Settlement, living 
for and on the trade which has brought together 20,000 
white men and Japanese at the Yangtsze's great dis- 
tributing centre. A large proportion of these Chinese are 
humble workers, artisans and coolies from Kiangpei, 
who come in their thousands to eat of the crumbs that 
fall from the rich man's table. All around and about the 
lordly mansions of the foreign trader, that line the banks 
of the Whangpoo, and within a stone's-throw of the 
splendid villas of the suburbs, the tide of native Ufe flows 
on, practically untouched in its ancestral ways by all the 
words and works of the stranger. If, by some miracle, 
every foreigner could be suddenly transported from China 
to-morrow, their going would have no more effect upon 
the inner life of this people than a tree feels when the 
birds leave its branches. They would pass, like other 
unaccountable phenomena, and leave not a trace behind. 



SHANGHAI 249 

Over the place where they had been, the tide of the 
nation's hfe would flow, unchanging and unchanged, and 
soon their very memory would be forgotten. In the 
back streets of the Settlements at Shanghai, the spiritual 
aloofness of the Chinese race impresses itself just as 
forcibly as in the remotest city of the interior. 

But there is something which impresses itself even more 
than this aloofness of the mind of the East, upon the 
traveller who returns to China after an absence of years, 
and that is the charm (almost biblical in its old-world 
quaUty) which lies in the philosophic serenity, the sterling 
faithfulness, and the sober efficiency of the race. Dynasties 
may pass, the legions thunder by, but in the finely- 
tempered soul of this people these things abide, and their 
savour is a fragrance of which the heirs of all the ages 
know nothing. Where, in all our bustling, husthng 
market-places, will you find anything to compare with 
the equal-minded fortitude, the kindliness, the almost 
dog-like fideUty of the Chinese, those simple virtues, 
fruits of the Sages' ancient tree of Knowledge, which 
have made him. the most lovable, and perhaps the most 
admirable, of human beings ? Fully to appreciate the 
character of humanity's primordial elder brother, one 
must have left the East awhile, gone back to the restless 
sources of our " Western learning," heard Bolshevism 
howling at the gates, and reahsed the cumulative effects 
of our creed of individualism upon the mind of the masses. 
Thereafter, China, with all its revolutions and economic 
distress, seems like a weather-beaten rock of sense and 
stability in a world of unrest, and the greetings of one's 
old friends (teachers, traders, and servants) come like 
some strain of homely music, half-forgotten. What have 
we to offer to the Chinese that shall serve them better 
than the virtues that are theirs ? Shall we lure them 
from their fields to our factories for the speeding up of 
trade ? With Christian Europe in the melting-pot, shall 
we tell them that Christianity will cure the thousand 
natural ills that flesh is heir to ? No doubt but that we 



250 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

shall do these things and continue to call them progress ; 
but let us not hope, in the doing of them, to convince the 
East of our moral or intellectual superiority. 

To return to the places where the best years of one's 
life have been spent, to be a transient spectator where 
once one played even a small part upon the stage, must 
always be a heart-stirring adventure, fraught with a 
gentle melancholy of retrospection, half pleasure and 
half pain. The pain predominates when, amidst the 
whispering ghosts of the years that are gone, one seeks in 
vain for the old familiar places, where only a few surviving 
landmarks greet one, like old friends in a strange land. 
The changes which the hand of man has wrought in and 
about the Foreign Settlements of Shanghai during the 
past ten years, have been as many and as great as those 
of any mushroom Eldorado of the new world, so that the 
revenant in search of old haunts, wanders here like a 
pelican in the wilderness. On all sides the triumphs of 
commerce-in-the-grand-manner confront him, imposing 
manifestations and apphances of noise and haste to the 
business of barter, more suggestive of Chicago than of 
the easy-going Shanghai of bygone days. It is as if 
Aladdin had persuaded every citizen to change his old 
lamps for new, his ricksha for a motor-car, and hence- 
forth to hve in a fever of trans-Atlantic hustle and bustle. 
All over the East, the traveller of to-day will find portents 
and proofs of a world of change, but nowhere such a trans- 
figuration, such breathless haste and hunger for new 
things, such a clean sweep of old signposts, as in the 
foreign community of Shanghai. Tientsin and Canton, 
for all their new traffics and discoveries, still preserve the 
essential features of their youth. Yokohama, by com- 
parison, stands unchanged and rooted in her ancient 
ways. From the purely commercial point of view, there 
may be matter for regret in such a state of suspended 
animation, but it has its sentimental and aesthetic com- 
pensations. True, one feels in the Treaty Ports of Japan 
that the alien intruder is here on sufferance only, that his 



SHANGHAI 251 

tide of peaceful penetration is on the ebb, and that there 
is a sense of suppressed irritation in the air ; nevertheless, 
I confess to a subtle satisfaction in finding so many 
ancient landmarks standing where they stood of old. 
Indeed, the Yokohama Bund and the approaches to the 
Bluff give one at first sight a queer Rip van Winkle feeling, 
so little changed are they from the scene which greeted 
the traveller on landing here thirty years ago. And men 
still seem to move here, as of old, with the leisurely 
dignity that marked the merchant princes of the 'eighties, 
their daily lives bounded by tranquil offices, the race- 
course, and the restful Club, their outer world limited 
to Tokyo and Kobe, Miyanoshita and Kamakura. The 
unpainted junks that move upon the dancing waters of 
the bay, the little Japanese shops that cling and cluster 
along the steep road which winds up to the Bluff, the silk 
stores and curio shops of the Benten-dore — all seem 
blissfully unconscious of the hand of Time, unmoved by 
the clamour that reverberates from Tokyo and Osaka. 
And over them all Fujiyama, the peerless, towers in 
serenity unshaken. 

The causes of Yokohama's comparative immutability 
and of Shanghai's swift-moving development lie so 
obviously in the conditions under which the Western 
trader exists in Japan and China respectively, that they 
call for little explanation. Both these Treaty Ports are, 
of their origin, exotic growths, excrescences grafted by 
force of arms upon the native tree of trade. Japan, 
being wise in her generation, and having diligently 
acquired the Western science of man-killing by machinery, 
has thrown off the shackles of extra-territoriality ; and 
the stranger within her gates has never been quite com- 
fortable since. But for China, with her patriarchial 
system and atavistic resistance to change, such an effort 
was impossible, and with the passing years, as her weak- 
ness increased with the crafts and assaults of the earth- 
hungry Powers, Shanghai has become, not only the 
stronghold of the extra-territoriaUsed trader, but the 



252 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

favourite residence and safety-vault of Chinese officials 
en retraite and a very Cave of AduUam for political refugees 
and plotters of every description. Under such conditions, 
it was inevitable that the city should wax fat and kick ; 
that the little self-governing community of foreign 
merchants, exempt from all laws and taxation, save 
those of their own making and their Taiping-days Charter, 
should grow into a great Free Town, richer by far than 
any of the Hanseatic League. The Shanghai of to-day 
is, in fact, a little State, an imperium in imperio adminis- 
tered by its Council elected by the foreign Land-renters, 
in which close upon a million Chinese enjoy the benefits 
of law and order (but no votes) in return for a modest 
rate of taxation. All the nations and kindreds of the 
earth have foregathered here, with fifteen Consuls flying 
fifteen flags, and each takes its part, tant Men que mat, 
in the affairs of the Settlement. It is a League of Nations, 
in farvo, which has stood the test of time, building up 
its administration by gradual process of precedents, and 
held together by the effective bond of a common interest 
in the development and protection of trade. As an 
object lesson of the federation of the world on a small 
scale, the Model Settlement of Shanghai deserves more 
attention than it has yet received from political econo- 
mists. When that object lesson is studied, it will be 
observed that the foundations upon which the success of 
the experiment has rested, differ in one very important 
respect from those upon which Mr. President Wilson and 
Lord Robert Cecil have proposed to build their League 
of Nations. The success of international co-operation 
at Shanghai has been brought about by the fact that, 
because the British Land-renters have always been in a 
considerable majority, the control of the administration 
has been automatically vested in British hands ; the 
little State has thus enjoyed the benefits of a continuous 
policy and a recognised directing authority. If the day 
ever comes — and the Japanese are moving heaven and 
earth to attain it — when the control of the administration 



SHANGHAI 258 

becomes a bone of contention between seriously divided 
national factions, the doom of the Model Settlement is 
sealed. The ideal of the League of Nations, based on a 
community of sentiment, may be admirable in theory, 
but its successful appHcation involves the necessity of 
recognition by all concerned of a common interest and 
an authoritative executive. It is on the rock of imaginary 
equal rights that the good ship Utopia goes to pieces. 

Meanwhile Shanghai, having iioo British voters on 
its Land-renters' list, as against 300 Japanese, 230 
Americans, and 150 Germans, still steers its prosperous 
course, unperturbed by the distant thunder of a world 
distraught, or the clouds of political strife that gather on 
the near horizon. How prosperous that course has been 
since 1913, he who runs may see; evidence of wealth, 
increasing and prolific, abounds on every side, from the 
teeming activity of wharves, warehouses, and factories, 
to the Capuan villas of the Bubbling Well. And the 
ease with which money has been made, both by merchants 
and mandarins, is reflected in the monstrous cost of 
living and in a degree of luxury in some respects unequalled 
either in New York or Buenos Aires. I have seen some- 
thing of the stupendous wealth of both these cities during 
and since the war ; I have walked their streets and dwelt 
in their hotels, wondering, like a poor relation, at the 
princeliness of their pomps and vanities, the lavishness 
of their resplendent lives; but in the matter of mellow 
creature comforts, of savoury fleshpots deftly served, no 
Croesus ~ of America, North or South, can ever hope to 
attain to the comfortable heights and depths that 
Shanghai takes for granted, because not all his wealth 
can buy the swift, soft-footed service, the ubiquitous 
efficiency of the Chinese house-boy, gardener, or cook. 
And neither Fifth Avenue nor the Calle Florida treat the 
dollar with quite the same splendid insouciance as does 
Shanghai's Nanking Road. When, last year, the exchange 
of the Mexican stood at about six shillings, Shanghai spent 
it in the same cheerful spirit as when it was worth two. 



254 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

Converted into sterling, salaries and prices in the gorgeous 
East verged on the ludicrous, and for the passing stranger, 
the disastrous. To pay the equivalent of £3 a day for 
the meagrest of hotel accommodation ; 24s. an hour for 
the hire of a Ford car ; 4s. 6d. for having one's hair cut, 
and IS. 2d. for the daily paper, is to fill one with something 
more than respect for the Orient. 

It was, of course, to be expected that with the develop- 
ment of railways opening up the interior, strategic trade 
centres like Shanghai and Hankow would grow and 
flourish exceedingly. But something more than an 
ordinary expansion of commerce was needed to produce 
the exuberant prosperity and modernity of present-day 
Shanghai. The vast profits of five years of war trade, 
practically untaxed, accounted for a good deal, and the 
hoarded wealth brought into the safe refuge of the Settle- 
ment by retired Chinese and Manchu officials since the 
upheaval of the Revolution, provided much new grist 
for the local mills of trade. The results, in any case, 
are astonishing, and not the least remarkable feature of 
the swiftly-changing scene is the American air of get- 
rich-quick, which has come to prevail in this most cos- 
mopolitan of all communities. The teeming tide of life 
which flowed along the Maloo ten years ago was a gently 
meandering stream, compared with the turbulent torrent 
of to-day. Looking back on the even tenor of existence 
in those days, the present kaleidoscopic activities of the 
community seem incredibly remote from their serenity; 
it is the difference between a vicar's garden-party and a 
race meeting. During and since the war, there has been, 
naturally enough, a new, and by no means inconsiderable, 
invasion of China by American firms and American ideas ; 
also the increasing number of Chinese students educated 
in the States was bound to produce its first and most 
conspicuous effects in the Settlements, which have ever 
been Young China's headquarters and chief stamping- 
ground. Nevertheless, compared to the whole foreign 
community, the number of Americans in Shanghai, 



SHANGHAI 255 

missionaries included, has not been enough to leaven the 
whole lump. Rather it would seem that similar economic 
conditions have produced similar results in Shanghai and 
Chicago. The gods have dropped the bait of opportunity 
into the pool of enterprise, and the fishes dart hither and 
thither in a restless commotion of competition. 

Here and there, above the tumultuous tide of change, 
a few old landmarks stand out and bring to mind the 
easy-going past — the Cathedral and the Custom House, 
the Lyceum Theatre and Country Club, the Joss-house 
at the BubbHng Well, the goodly messuage of the British 
Consulate, and the Race-course (once on the outskirts, 
now at the very heart of the Settlement), a perennial 
monument to the foresight of the first City Fathers. 
Even on the Bund, amidst the turmoil of tramcars, 
motors, and lorries, there are sights and sounds that recall 
the Shanghai of early days : the mustering of brokers' 
victorias at the Bank — owners, mafoos and ponies, just 
as they were years and years ago, and all serenely un- 
conscious of being an anachronism ; the rhythmic chant 
of swift -moving coolies, unloading cargo at the jetties ; 
the never-ceasing song of native labour; wheelbarrow 
coolies staggering under their monstrous burdens. And 
on the river, the old familiar vision of junks and sampans 
innumerable, blue sails and brown, and twirhng yuloh 
blades, the moving homes of men whose lives are as the 
lives of their forefathers were in the old time before them, 
and as the lives of their sons will be, when we are all 
forgotten. These glimpses and voices from the dense 
background of purely native life, these swift intimations 
of its pitiless struggle for sheer survival, seem to me full 
of a deeper significance than all the glamour and glitter 
of Shanghai's exotic modernity. As I watch the human 
pageant, the social activities of Mrs. Compradore Wang, 
driving in her Rolls-Royce to her villa in the Western 
District, or those of Mrs. Rosenkrantz, who takes her to 
the play at the Lyceum, count for less than these half- 
naked coolies singing at their work. For these ladies 



256 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

are at best but transient phenomena, froth on the crest 
of a wave ; but the humble sons of Han are as they have 
been since the days of Babylon, and as they will be when 
Europe's present frontiers are wiped out, a great tide of 
the ocean of human life, mysterious and profound. 

When one reflects upon the present state and probable 
future of industrialism in Europe and America, the 
ant-like capacity of the Chinese for monotonous labour 
assumes a new significance. Not only does it explain 
most of the rapid growth of Shanghai, but it brings before 
us, much nearer than of old, the vision of the only real 
Yellow Peril, the competitive results of this mass of 
unsophisticated cheap labour upon countless workshops 
and factories overseas. Here, before our eyes, are the 
beginning of a new phase and new consequences of 
economic pressure, unmistakable evidences of the fact 
that Capital is beginning to perceive the value of this 
vast reservoir of efficient, easily-contented workers, and is 
making ready to use it. Already Captains of industry — 
Americans, British, Germans, and Japanese (especially 
Japanese) — are hastening to map out the ground, selecting 
coigns of vantage all over the country, for the organisation 
and application of all this dynamic energy to the develop- 
ment of manufactures ; and this assuredly is only the 
thin end of a wedge which must eventually move the 
whole fabric of international trade. Assuming that 
industrial enterprise can be organised in China under 
conditions which shall secure the co-operation of Chinese 
capital and the support of Chinese officialdom, it will be 
as impossible for any European or American industry to 
face its competition in any open market, as it is for the 
white countries to admit Asiatic immigration. 

It is not only the foreigner who perceives the possi- 
bilities of the situation brought about in the East by the 
war of Labour against Capital in the West ; the Chinese 
are fully alive to them. They are also well aware of the 
fact that, so long as the foreigner's factories are confined 
within the narrow limits of the Treaty Ports, until he can 



SHANGHAI 257 

secure the free use of land and labour in close proximity 
to the chief sources of raw materials, there can be no 
rapid development of enterprise on the grand scale of 
which the Americans talk. As in the past, they will 
undoubtedly resist, with all the effective weight of their 
inertia and powers of obstruction, any attempt by the 
foreigner to exploit China's raw materials and cheap 
labour for his own exclusive benefit. But there appears 
to be a very definite disposition in their high places to 
entertain proposals for co-operative enterprise, of a kind 
which will give Chinese officialdom an equal share of 
profits and a fair share of " face," in return for the 
privilege of trading and manufacturing rights in the 
interior. Unless the present omens are misleading, we 
are hkely to hear a good deal in the near future of 
Anglo-Chinese joint enterprises. 

There exists a certain group of Cantonese intransigeants, 
it is true, who proclaim the readiness and the ability of 
the Chinese to handle highly-organised industrial business 
without the help of foreign capital or foreign technical 
experts, and who therefore denounce the co-operative 
idea. They cite the success of purely Chinese companies, 
such as the Nanyang Tobacco Company, or Wing On's new 
department stores, as evidence in support of their con- 
tention, and they point to the great businesses that 
have been built up by Chinese merchant princes in 
Hong Kong and Java, in the Straits and the South Seas. 
The question thus raised is extremely interesting and a 
little delicate. It is evident that if, without assistance, 
the Chinese can provide efficient and rehable administra- 
tion for the development of native industries, they can 
eat up their competitors at their leisure and be perfectly 
justified in so doing. In that case, the raison d'etre of 
half the Europeans in China would cease to exist, and the 
Treaty Ports would soon become the diminished homes 
of petty commission agents and disgruntled shippers. 
But is it possible? Of the intelligence and business 
capacity of the Chinese merchant, there can be no question ; 
s 



258 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

yet the fact remains that there has never been a case 
in China of a public company successfully handled by 
Chinese for Chinese. There is all the difference in the 
world between a Chinese merchant conducting his personal 
or family business, and the same man acting as director 
of a railway or mining company ; the great names made 
by Chinese merchant-adventurers in the South have 
always been associated with family concerns, and the 
same is generally true of modern enterprises, such as 
Wing On's, where the initiative comes from Chinese 
educated abroad. There is also a wide difference between 
the position of a Chinese business conducted in a British 
Colony, or even in the No Man's Land of a Treaty Port, 
and one which has to work out its own salvation in some 
inland province of China, exposed to the rapacity of local 
officials and the bigoted conservatism of the gentry. 
When all is said and done, the fact remains that, although 
there is probably more hoarded wealth in China to-day 
than ever before, none of its owners — ^be they merchants 
or mandarins — display any inclination to invest it either 
in Government loans or in purely Chinese companies 
under official auspices. At the same time, many of the 
richest and ablest men in the country are prepared to 
put money into co-operative enterprises, with financial 
control vested in the foreigner. Money talks. 



Any one who is trying to see the problems of the Far 
East as a whole, to form a just estimate of the various 
forces at work beneath the surface, and the probable 
resultant of their actions and reactions, can hardly fail 
to be impressed by the intellectual and spiritual detach- 
ment of the foreign community of Shanghai from all 
things Chinese, except those which directly affect the 
commercial outlook. Even allowing for the fact that 
here they have no abiding city, there is something passing 
strange in the earnestness of their concentration on purely 
local affairs, their complete absorption in trade and sport. 



SHANGHAI 259 

their cheerful indifference to the language, literature, and 
institutions of the native-born. And even more remark- 
able than this aloofness of the foreign colony, is the exotic 
quaUty of Young China's poHtical and intellectual 
activities, always manifested, to the sound of trumpets 
and drums in the Tom Tiddler's ground of the Model 
Settlement. They loom very large in the world's Press, 
these activities of the semi-Europeanised product of our 
Mission schools and Universities overseas, and their 
reverberating rhetoric evokes many weird echoes in 
distant lands ; nevertheless, their voice is that of the 
intellectual hybrid of a class which has all the quahties 
and all the defects of the half-breed, but is without real 
roots either in China or in Europe. It is a class which, 
though in some instances its intentions have been 
excellent, has proved itself to be utterly incapable of 
originating or directing any practical policy for the good 
of China. 

The foreign merchant at Shanghai, whose contact with 
Chinese affairs is usually limited to half an hour's chat 
with his semi-denationalised compradore, may be for- 
given for mistaking the cackle of these highly vocal 
young gentlemen for the murmur of the Chinese world. 
It is also probably true that the foreign community's 
collective vanity is rather tickled by appearing before the 
world as godfather to a movement in which many good, 
earnest men have discerned the makings of a new heaven 
and a new earth. But even allowing for all this, and 
recognising the fact that a busy commercial outpost has 
not much leisure for philosophy or political economy, I 
find myself unable to account for the persistence, at this 
date, of fallacies which were natural enough in the first 
enthusiasm for the Revolution that overthrew the Manchu 
dynasty. Generally speaking, it would seem to be due 
to lack of perspective and sense of proportion ; but in a 
good many instances it would seem that belief in these 
fallacies has been professed as part of a deliberate policy, 
intended to provide good fishing in troubled waters 



260 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

In certain quarters this policy is obviously inspired by 
a desire to undermine British preponderance in the local 
executive government. There are, no doubt, sincere 
idealists and earnest parlour Bolsheviks who encourage the 
extremists of Young China militant in such matters as 
the immediate abohtion of extra-territoriaUty, from 
perfectly disinterested motives; but as a rule the in- 
spiration of this kind of sympathy may be traced either 
to the mud-fishers aforesaid, or to the anxiety of some 
well-paid " adviser " to do something to justify his 
position, or to the desire of well-meaning busy-bodies to 
loom large in the pubhc eye. 

Young China's record, having reference to the funda- 
mental question of the nation's fitness for representative 
government, has been discussed elsewhere : for ' the 
moment, we are concerned only with the Model Settle- 
ment. And here, despite the cumulative evidence of 
the eight years which have passed since the proclamation 
of the Repubhc, the delusion still seems to prevail, even 
amongst sober business men, that, with the passing of 
the Monarchy, a sudden and miraculous change has 
taken place in the structural character of the Chinese 
people, and that the passive non-resisting type is a thing 
of the past. In spite of the obvious fact that the so- 
called " parliamentarians " have reduced the country, 
pohtically speaking, to the level of Mexico or Venezuela, 
aU sorts and conditions of men are ready to assure you, 
not only at their dinner-tables, but in pubhc meetings 
assembled, that the Chinese of to-day are a totally 
different people from those of the last generation; that 
" things are moving very fast, sir, and we must keep 
abreast of the times." They wiU ask you to observe the 
movement for the emancipation of women, the number 
and activity of poUtical associations in their midst, the 
increasing signs of organisation amongst certain sections 
of Chinese labour, and many other proofs and portents of 
" progress." It is true that, for the moment, one does 
not hear quite so much as one did in 1912 of the 



SHANGHAI 261 

regenerative force of Parliamentary procedure at Peking, 
or the moral effect of the abolition of opium, because, with 
three rival Parliaments contesting the field, and opium 
more plentiful than ever before, it is difficult for the most 
earnest of visionaries to make the facts of the situation 
square with the theory of fundamental change. But 
the vague belief in the increasing poUtical consciousness 
of the Chinese masses persists, nevertheless, together with 
a sHpshod profession of the fashionable faith in the 
miraculous benefits which China may expect to derive 
from " democracy." 

I find it hard to account for the persistence of these 
delusions amongst any but vocational ideaHsts. That 
the missionaries and school-teachers who are largely 
responsible for Young China's political activities and 
aspirations, should still hope to gather rare and refreshing 
fruit from the tree of their own planting, is natural 
enough. It is in the nature of the rhapsodist to place his 
hopes for to-morrow above the experience of a thousand 
yesterdays, and to attach more importance to the form 
of a government than to the character of the men who 
claim to administer it. But the prevalence of this kind 
of plausible optimism in a business community which, 
with regard to its own affairs, can never afford to ignore 
the experience of yesterday, is chiefly due, I think, to the 
fact that bhnd faith in " democracy," as a cure for all 
human ills, has become a fashionable shibboleth all the 
world over, and this by reason of intellectual laziness, 
and because the catchwords of our later-day demagogues, 
their appeal and the secret of their success, are based on 
sentiment rather than on sense, and on hysteria rather 
than on history. At Shanghai, in particular, the teachings 
of history have carried even less weight than elsewhere, 
because the eloquence and fervour with which Young 
China proclaimed its discovery of Utopia, to the thumping 
of innumerable tubs, created a clamour and a series of 
moving pictures sufficient to disturb most minds, and to 
prevent them from inquiring whether this Utopia was the 



262 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

sort of place in which the Chinese people, as a whole, 
might find themselves at home. And yet, for those who, 
amidst the tumult and the shouting, found time to 
reflect, who remembered the millions of patient, poUtically- 
unconscious toilers that made the real China, it must 
always have been apparent that these " Western-learning " 
Intellectuals and their " emancipated " women were no 
more representative of China than, shall we say, the 
Cantonese communities of Singapore or CaUfornia ? And 
they must have had their doubts also as to the wisdom 
of those Catholic liberties of the Foreign Settlements — 
especially on the French side — ^which permit conspirators, 
malcontents, and political refugees of every kind to hatch 
their plots and load their bombs with impunity. These 
gentry use the safe shelter of the Municipality for their 
own sordid ends, and by means of the local vernacular 
Press attain to a degree of importance which otherwise 
they could never have achieved. The evil results of this 
are twofold : firstly, that the profession of political 
agitator has been made attractively safe ; and secondly, 
that throughout the Treaty Ports there prevails an 
exaggerated estimate of Young China's political influence 
and regenerative ideas. I do not mean by this to suggest 
that new-school politicians, such as Sun Yat-sen or Dr. 
C. T. Wang, and the ferment which they have produced 
at home and abroad, are wholly unimportant. The point 
which I desire to emphasise is, that those observers who 
discern in this ferment the re-birth of China, and the 
sudden awakening of the nation to a new sense of political 
morality, are overlooking not only the instinctive con- 
servatism of the race, but the self-seeking ambitions 
which have been so powerful a factor in producing this 
upheaval. No one who knows anything of China to-day 
can possibly maintain that all the professional politicians' 
talk of constitutions, parliaments, and democracy evokes 
any interest, or indeed any response, from the great 
masses of the people. 
There is something pathetically suggestive of the 



SHANGHAI 263 

intellectual disorder of Young China, and of its inability 
to grasp the essential spirit of Western civilisation, in the 
fearful and wonderful garments worn by its emancipated 
sisters, cousins, and aunts, not to mention those of DeUlah 
and Aspasia, with whom native traditions of decorum 
naturally count for less than the desire to be conspicuous. 
The clothes and manners affected by Chinese women of 
the respectable classes in Shanghai to-day are enough to 
justify an old-time resident in the behef that Confucius, 
fihal piety, and the patriarchal system have gone with 
the Monarchy into limbo ; that the days of the polygamist, 
with his docile, secluded women, are done; and that 
female suffrage is in sight. But, as a matter of fact, the 
fantastically- apparelled creatures are a purely local and 
transient manifestation, the product of an abnormal and 
exotic environment, neither flesh, fish, fowl, nor good red 
herring. Their hybrid garments and jaunty assumption 
of foreign customs and manners merely typify the in- 
evitable confusion and unrest of this No Man's Land 
'twixt East and West. Take one of these quaint little 
monsters, with her tam-o'-shanter cap, her woollen 
muffler, short silk trousers, spats, and high-heeled boots, 
and put her down in any city of the interior ; if she did 
not speedily run for cover, she would most assuredly be 
mobbed. Here in Shanghai she may ignore the Sacred 
Edict with impunity; she can indulge in courtship, and 
even in marriage, d. VAmericaine ; she may join, un- 
chaperoned, in the afternoon parade of fashion on the 
Nanking Road ; she may take part in political demonstra- 
tions, and even address public meetings ; but she does 
these things because she is a product of Shanghai, and 
Shanghai is not China. In certain ultra-modern circles, 
led by ruffling blades fresh from American Universities, 
Chinese ladies have even been known to snatch a fearful 
joy from turkey-trotting to the sounds of jazz, thereby 
violating all Oriental ideas of female propriety. Greatly 
daring, one or two of them have even done it in Peking, 
and I observe that Sir John Jordan, talking to a London 



264 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

reporter, has cited the fact as proof of China's remarkable 
progress. I note also that the same genial authority 
referred to their newly-developed interest in poHtics and 
women's rights, all of which merely help to make it more 
and more difi&cult for the uninitiated to determine the 
real significance of Shanghai's eccentric shadow-play. 
As for that enterprising reporter, he must, I think, have 
caught Sir John unawares, for none knows better than 
that wise and kindly man that the race-mind of the 
Chinese hates and fears, more than all else, those en- 
croachments of the West which threaten its instinctive 
moralities and ancestral proprieties. Persicos odi, puer, 
apparatus. 

During the period of my visit to Shanghai, the com- 
munity, native and foreign, was much exercised over a 
question which has frequently vexed it in recent years, 
namely, the right of the Chinese taxpayers to representa- 
tion on the Municipal Council ; in other words, to a share 
in the direct government of the Settlement. Young 
China's fervour of excitement and eloquence, and its 
skilful use of the machinery of intimidation in deahng 
with the timid shopkeeping class, presented on this 
occasion no new features. There were the usual telegrams 
in all directions, the usual manifestoes by all sorts of 
associations, real and imaginary, the usual passionate 
assertion of China's sovereign rights, accompanied by 
threats of strikes and personal denunciations. But, as 
an example of windy agitation on a trackless sea of 
sentiment, there was something very significant, not 
only in Young China's handling of the matter, but in the 
sjrmpathetic, not to say respectful, reception accorded to 
their views by officials and influential members of the 
foreign community. The Chinese claim to representation, 
based on elementary justice, is morally unanswerable; 
to deny it is morally impossible, since nine-tenths of the 
Settlement's revenues are collected from Chinese rate- 
payers. Unfortunately, however, the existence of the 
Settlement itself is equally indefensible on broad grounds 




MILITARISM IN THE MAKING. 




B. T. Prideaux] 



THE FEMALE OF THE SPECIES. 



(These pictures were taken at a Chinese School in the French 
Settlement, Shanghai.) 



SHANGHAI 265 

of justice. It was originally established, and has ever 
since been maintained, by the law of the stronger, and 
because Chinese methods of administration could never 
provide the foreign trader with anything like security for 
life and property. For that matter, the whole principle 
of extra-territoriaUty can only be defended on grounds 
of political expediency, in themselves unjust. But if 
extra-territoriahty goes, the Foreign Settlement goes also, 
not only as an object-lesson in efficient administration, 
but as a sanctuary for Chinese partisans and plotters of 
the losing side, and a safe hiding-place for the wealth of 
prudent mandarins. The most astonishing thing about 
this particular agitation was, that the excitable students 
with whom it originated should have been supported 
by the sober-headed Guilds and Chambers of Commerce, 
for these would be the very first to suffer from the intro- 
duction of mandarin methods in Municipal affairs; but 
moral courage in the face of noisy intimidation has never 
been a characteristic of the Chinese merchant. Equally 
astonishing, from the transient spectator's point of view, 
was the failure of the foreign community's representatives 
to put Young China firmly in its place; for it should 
have been self-evident that a claim to give the Chinese 
seats on the Council, as a matter of equity, and based on 
their numerical strength, would give them, on the same 
grounds, a perfect right to absolute control. The obvious 
course, whereby alone the just claims of the Chinese could 
be reconciled with the facts of the situation (a course 
which should have been adopted when the Guilds proposed 
it in 1906), is for the foreign community to recognise and 
encourage a Chinese Consultative Committee, elected 
as the Chinese ratepayers may think fit, to take its 
advice, whenever feasible, in matters affecting purely 
Chinese interests, and to give all possible publicity to 
its representations. The essential need of the situation 
is machinery for the ventilation of the bona-fide grievances 
of the law-abiding Chinese community. Such grievances 
undoubtedly exist, but the professional agitator who 



266 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

plies his noisome trade under the protection of the 
Municipality should be forcibly reminded that these 
grievances are as gossamer on the summer breeze when 
compared with the burdens borne by those who dwell 
in Chinese cities — " whose children are far from safety, 
whose harvest the hungry eateth up, and the robber 
swalloweth up their substance." 

From the point of view of the Chinese Government (if 
ever it reaches a state of coherence such as shall enable 
it to maintain one), the protection which the self-governing 
Settlements of the Treaty Ports afford to pohtical refugees 
and conspirators, is likely to present a much more serious 
problem. The asylum found by the " provisional govern- 
ment of the Republic of Korea " in the French Settlement 
at Shanghai, constitutes a precedent which might easily 
develop along hues fraught with real danger to the destinies 
of the Model Settlement. The path of wisdom for the 
City Fathers, looking to the future, must he in barring 
all but purely local politics, and in preventing the Settle- 
ment from becoming an Alsatia and a stamping-ground 
for wild asses. 



CHAPTER XVI 

NORTHWARD THROUGH SHANTUNG 

Twelve years ago, the highest circles of foreign finance 
and diplomacy at Peking — following the German lead — 
professed their genuine belief in the capacity of Chinese 
officialdom to provide honest and efficient management 
for the railways then being built, or about to be built, 
with foreign capital. The terms under which the railway 
loan agreements for the Tientsin-Pukou, the Hangchow- 
Ningpo, and other railways were concluded, gave prac- 
tical effect to this belief. " Pukou terms," as they were 
called, eliminated from the foreign loans conditions of 
effective supervision over railway construction and 
finance, which had hitherto been declared indispensable 
safeguards for the bondholder. They were, in effect, a 
declaration of faith in the mandarin, extorted from 
British and French political finance by the pressure of 
German competition, and for which Germany received 
prompt reward from the Viceroy Chang Chih-tung and 
other mandarins. British officialdom, as is its wont, 
made a virtue of necessity and followed the line of least 
resistance to the sound of its own trumpets. " We must 
put the Chinese on their mettle," wrote an eminent 
authority, " and hope for the best." But, as a matter 
of fact, the Chinese were put on to our metal — good 
pounds English — with results which every disinterested 
observer knew to be inevitable. 

If I thus refer to the pre-war past, it is because, 
despite the parlous results of these experiments, history 
seems to be in considerable danger of repeating itself, 
in the form of further foreign loans for the immediate 
benefit of the mandarin and the ultimate ruin of China. 
And if I refer to the present conditions of management 

267 



268 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

and traffic on the Tientsin-Pukou line, it is because no 
one can travel by that railway, with his eyes and ears 
open, and remain inclined to the behef that Chinese 
officialdom, either of the young or the old school, is 
capable of honest administration without an authoritative 
guiding hand. 

To pass from the Shanghai-Nanking railway, on the 
south bank of the Yangtsze, to the Pukou Hne on the 
north, is to pass from comparative efficiency to chaos. 
Even on the Shanghai hne, misplaced sympathy for local 
ideas of self-determination has seriously curtailed the 
railway's utility and earning power ; with proper ware- 
housing accommodation and roUing stock the carrying 
capacity might easily be doubled, but the Chinese 
Managing Directorate prefers the system of small profits 
and quick returns, and the foreign staff have learned by 
painful experience that it is fooUsh to kick against the 
pricks. The permanent way and rolHng stock, however, 
are maintained in good condition and the passenger traffic 
is well managed.^ 

The sight which greets the traveller's eye, as he crosses 
the river to the Pukou terminus of the northern hne, is 
perhaps the most convincing object-lesson in mandarin 
business methods to be met with in all China. Stretching 
far up and down the river-bank are vast accumulations 
of cargo, mostly perishable, awaiting transportation, all 
unprotected from the weather. Piece goods, yam, tobacco, 
and grain of aU kinds are stacked in tumultuous confusion, 
and in the rainy season, when import and export cargo 
lie miserably marooned in mud, the merchants' losses, 
for which there is no compensation, are enormous. The 
profits which the railway has earned in the past should 
have amply sufficed to build the necessary warehouses 

1 During the year 1920, 7,200,000 passengers travelled on the 
Shanghai-Nanking Railway and 5,500,000 on the Shanghai- 
Hangchow line, in each case an increase of about 10 per cent, on 
the preceding year. Railway of&cials declare that the systems 
have practically reached the maximum development possible 
with their present rolling stock. 



NORTHWARD THROUGH SHANTUNG 269 

and to provide the line with sufficient roUing stock; but 
from the outset the railway has been regarded as a milch 
cow by the officials, civil and miHtary, who have succes- 
sively controlled it ; and to-day it stands, or rather 
totters, as a melancholy example of hopeless inefficiency. 
As in the case of the Luhan line, every dollar has 
gone to satisfy the needs or greed of the mandarin. 
Freight charges have been raised to the scale of EngUsh 
railways, the third-class passenger rate to two cents a 
mile for the most primitive kind of transportation. The 
rolling stock is in a deplorable condition and wholly 
inadequate to the traffic available. One of the most 
prominent officials at the capital, long connected with 
the Ministry of Communications, admitted to me frankly 
that, under proper management, the earning power of 
this railway might easily be quadrupled — and the same 
holds good of other Unes — but, he added, it will be 
necessary to raise another loan to put things right ! It 
was a henchman of this same official, a highly intelli- 
gent representative of Young China educated abroad, 
who, as Managing Director of the railway, became so 
conspicuous that he was finally impeached and removed 
from office, only to become Manager of the Bank of 
Communications at Shanghai. He lately held an in- 
fluential post in close proximity to the President at 
Peking. Ex pede Herculem. 

During the period of acute disorder in the Central 
Provinces which followed the Revolution of 1911, the 
southern section of the line — ^the section built with 
British capital — was for a considerable time at the mercy 
of General Chang Hsiin, the redoubtable military chieftain 
of Shantung who, in 1917, achieved notoriety by his 
attempt to restore the Manchu dynasty. Chang and his 
subordinates organised and controlled the business of the 
railway for their own convenience and profit ; they did 
a thriving trade in the free carriage of rice, ostensibly 
for the troops, but actually for sale. Chang appointed 
his own Traffic Manager and, though nominally a loyal 



270 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

servant of the Government at Peking, treated the railway 
as his own preserve. On one occasion, when he had 
commandeered and held in reserve twelve locomotives, 
to the complete dislocation of ordinary traffic, eleven of 
them were recovered by the lawful railway authorities 
in exchange for Chang's favourite wife, who had been 
seized and held as hostage by the revolutionaries at 
Nanking. Yet, if report speaks truly, Chang Hsiin's 
swashbucklers never practised the gentle art of " squeez- 
ing " the railway with anything like the deliberate 
rapacity of the civil mandarins who succeeded them. 

At Tsinanfu, once the advanced post of German 
influence in China, one finds to-day none of the lawless- 
ness and disorder which obtained in the days of General 
Chang Hsiin. Thanks to the firm hand and clear head 
of the Civil Governor, Chiieh tajen, the capital of Shantung 
affords an excellent object-lesson of the benefits of bene- 
volent autocracy in China and of the progress to which 
the country might attain under good government. The 
results which this youthful but determined official has 
achieved in the administration of local and provincial 
affairs — complicated as they are by Japan's claims to 
the reversion of Germany's special rights and interests — 
reveal on a small scale China's urgent need of a strong 
man who shall put an end to the strife of predatory 
politicians and give peace in his time. There is nothing 
of the j&re-eater about the Civil Governor of Shantung. 
Like his famous colleague, Chang Tso-lin, whose word 
is law throughout Manchuria, he impresses one at first 
sight as a scholarly person of mild and modest manners. 
But beneath the velvet glove there is an iron hand; 
his suave demeanour conceals an inflexible will, great 
brain-power, and a shrewd statecraft remarkable in 
a man of thirty-seven, comparatively inexperienced 
in pubHc affairs. It is not only in progressive local 
administration and public works that the Civil Governor's 
hand has made itself felt at Tsinanfu ; he has succeeded 
under circumstances of peculiar difficulty in maintaining 



NORTHWARD THROUGH SHANTUNG 271 

friendly, and at the same time dignified, relations, not 
only with the Japanese authorities at Kiaochao, but 
with the faction in power at Peking and with his own 
Provincial Assembly. And he is one of the few high 
officials who have had the sense and the courage to 
rebuke publicly the pernicious ignorance and indisciphne 
of the student movement. 

It was at the bleak dawn of a January morning that 
our train brought us to Tsinanfu, through the wintry 
desolation of the northern loess lands, a treeless vista of 
monotonous, dust-coloured country, frost-bound and 
dismal. It was only just dayhght as we passed from the 
clean and well-kept railway station to the hotel — both 
buildings are melancholy monuments to the glory that 
once was Deutschdum in these parts — ^but already the 
broad macadamised roads of the Settlement were swarm- 
ing with Shantung's human beasts of burden — cooHes 
doggedly pushing single-wheeled barrows, all laden with 
incredible mountains of cargo. And from these barrows 
there arose a lamentable clamour of creaking wheels, 
shrill and incessant as the song of gigantic cicadas, the 
labour lied of all North China. Threading its way 
through this ant -like procession of untiring toilers, the 
Civil Governor's motor-car (it is the only one in Tsinanfu) 
seemed an anachronism — almost an impertinence. In the 
Governor's car was one of the Governor's Secretaries, 
Mr. Tsen Shan-wang, B.S., A.M., Ph.D., educated in 
America, a highly intelligent and amiable specimen of 
Young China, who, by sheer agility of body and mind, 
was apparently able to combine the duties of Secretary 
in Charge of Public Works and Industries at Tsinanfu 
with those of an expert geologist under the Ministry of 
Commerce and Agriculture at Peking, besides being 
technical adviser to one or two Chinese mining companies 
elsewhere. Mr. Tsen's opinions of men and affairs, 
characteristically American, were based on the fixed 
idea that noise and bustle are symptoms of a superior 
civilisation, that progress is a product of machinery, and 



272 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

that ballot-boxes are the only reliable signposts to Utopia. 
In the old rock-garden of the Civil Governor's garden, 
with its stone barge of state, its fan-shaped pavilion, its 
poet's corners and classical inscriptions, this new-school 
mandarin gave one the same feeling of incongruity as 
the linoleum on the floor of His Excellency's library or 
the electric lights that wink at you from venerable 
trees, where the city's scavenger kites have roosted for 
centuries. 

The Governor's second private secretary, Mr. Hsii, a 
young graduate from Chekiang, combined a limited 
English vocabulary and American ideas about " progress " 
with an instinctive reverence for Chinese scholarship and 
all that it stands for. His mind was therefore in a 
parlous state, eternally wandering in a wilderness of 
strange doctrines, while drawn to its own spiritual home. 
Something of its tumultuous state may be gathered from 
the fact that his hybrid clothing ended in a bowler hat 
at one end and carpet slippers at the other. For that 
matter, all over the East to-day, the mark of the West 
displays itself in this sort of hideous incongruity. The 
Governor's reception-room was typical of a state of mind 
that produces neither flesh, fish, fowl, nor good red 
herring : an American stove, backed by Soochow cur- 
tains, leopard-skin rugs on a linoleum-covered floor, 
Chinese book-boxes and ancient scrolls, cheek by jowl 
with a cheap tapestry sofa and a bedroom dressing-table 
that did duty as a curio stand. 

There were many other sights and sounds beside the 
Governor's car in the neighbourhood of the railway 
station significant of the impact of the West upon the 
East. Rickshas of fearful and wonderful construction, 
a local species provided with huge horns and lamps, 
have superseded the old cumbrous cart as the vehicle 
of the upper and middle classes. Most of their owners 
and patrons — a stout and sturdy lot of citizens — were 
wearing, over their silk robes, fur-collared European over- 
coats of the nondescript kind that now confronts one all 



NORTHWARD THROUGH SHANTUNG 273 

over the East ; unseemly garments which have reduced 
the outer man in China, Manchuria, and Japan to a 
common level of dull hideousness. In addition to the 
usual crowd of passengers, the train had brought a large 
batch of coolies repatriated from France; wiry fellows 
these, easily distinguishable from the unsophisticated 
native by a certain alertness in their gait and a general 
air of self-rehance, yet civil-spoken and displaying none 
of that turbulence which one had been led to expect. 
And everywhere in the thronged streets, amidst the 
goodly trees and solid buildings that remind us of Teutons 
departed, were the sons of Dai Nippon, civihan agents 
and harbingers of " peaceful penetration," more easily 
to be recognised here by their short stature than farther 
south. They held themselves discreetly, yet with dignity, 
as if conscious ahke of their isolation and of the greatness 
of the Island Empire behind them. And as a reminder 
of that greatness, to gladden their hearts, there were 
brisk-stepping companies of Japanese soldiers, detach- 
ments of the troops whose vanguard duty it is to 
" protect " a Chinese railway on Chinese soil. 

Driving to the Civil Governor's yamen through the 
native city, one realises, as in many other cities of 
Cathay, how wide is the gulf that hes between the exotic 
modernism of Young China — as displayed in the area of 
the Railway Settlement — and the immutable conditions 
imposed upon the masses of the population by their 
economic necessities and deep-rooted conservatism. 
Nowhere is this contrast more conspicuous than at 
Shanghai, where, in spite of the Foreign Settlement's 
splendid object-lesson in efficient self-government, the 
native city remains practically as it was in the days of 
the Taiping rebellion — ^neglected, insanitary, unkempt ; 
to the traveller's eye unpleasant and to his nose an 
offence. At Canton, Soochow, Wuchang, and other 
provincial capitals it is much the same. Wherever native 
officialdom has demonstrated its capacity to develop 
municipal administration on modern fines, the experiment 

T 



274 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

always has the appearance of elaborate window-dressing, 
because of the medieval squalor all around and about 
it. Here at Tsinanfu there are many schemes for widen- 
ing and metalling the narrow streets, for public Hghting 
and sanitation, and given twenty years of an energetic 
Governor like Chiieh tajen, no doubt something might 
be done; but generally speaking, it will need an earth- 
quake or a conflagration hke the Fire of London to 
prepare the ground for effective modernisation of the 
great cities of China. 

At dinner with the Governor at his yamen, after a 
day spent in visiting the city and inspecting the corps 
d' elite of General Ma Liang (of which more anon), there 
was talk of many things : of the Japanese, their flagrant 
trade in opium, and their claims to " special rights and 
interests " in Shantung ; of the strife of party factions 
at Peking, and the need for national unity; of the 
student movement, and His Excellency's recent homily 
to its leaders ; of missionaries and Bolsheviks, of Manchus 
and of Mings. His Excellency held strong views on 
the necessity of curbing the arbitrary power of the pro- 
vincial Tuchuns and centraUsing effective government at 
Peking; pending that happy consummation, however, 
he was satisfied to maintain law and order in Shantung 
and to sit tight. He saw no immediate prospect of 
reconciliation and unity between the northern and 
southern factions, and deplored the ascendancy of 
Japanese influence at the capital, but hoped that 
England and the United States might intervene to 
reheve the situation. 

The only other guests were two of His Excellency's 
secretaries — one my friend Mr. Hsii, the young man from 
Chekiang, and the other a middle-aged scholar of the 
orthodox school, in native dress. Mr. Hsii, while studi- 
ously deferential to his chief, took an active part in the 
conversation, but the literary secretary's utterances were 
limited to those whereby, according to pohte usage in 
China, the thankful guest signifies his appreciation of a 



NORTHWARD THROUGH SHANTUNG 275 

hearty meal. Only once did he interpolate a remark, 
and that was to express his admiration for the military 
genius of General Ma Liang. 

The worthy General is something more than a local 
celebrity. His wide reputation is based on the fact that, 
in a crumbling world of chance and change, he has held 
fast in his profession to the venerable traditions of the 
mighty past, and, to use an expressive Americanism, has 
" got away with it." His ideas on the subject of military 
training and the art of war are those of China's ancient 
sages, of the scholar strategists of antiquity (very similar 
to those solemnly propounded by the Viceroy Chang 
Chih-tung at the time of the Japanese War), and he has 
applied them with laborious minuteness to the training 
of his local army of 20,000 men. What is more, he has 
written an elaborate treatise on the subject in seven 
volumes, of which he gave me a copy — a learned work, 
much praised by the literati. He is a firm believer in 
physical, not to say acrobatic, training, as the founda- 
tion of mihtary efficiency. Of the prowess of the sturdy 
Shantung men of his command he is inordinately proud, 
and an exhibition of their skill forms part of every 
official entertainment at Tsinanfu. The performance is 
well worth seeing, for it includes physical drill, jiu-jitsu, 
wresthng matches, fencing with pikes, javelins, and staves, 
weight-lifting, acrobatic turns, and many other feats very 
deftly performed by men in the pink of condition; but 
of the things pertaining to modern warfare, not a sign. 
" If every province had an army like mine," said the 
General, after the concluding tour de force (in which a 
brick placed on a man's head was smashed with a sledge- 
hammer), " China could defy the world." Tentatively I 
ventured to speak of modern artillery (which, I observed, 
might slay even the finest athletes at twenty miles' 
range), of aeroplanes and poison gas. The General 
expressed his frank contempt for artillery. " How can they 
see to fire by night ? " he asked. " In the dark, these 
fellows of mine would creep upon them and capture them 



276 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

all." As we drove back from the review to the Civil 
Governor's yamen, my host observed, " The General is 
a very conservative man; all the students hate him." 
And I wondered whether, in his heart, the Governor's 
sympathies were with the scholar-strategist or with the 
students. 

On the journey from Tsinanfu by rail to Peking, via 
Tientsin, I (who had not been in these parts since 1910) 
could discern but Uttle outward evidence of the stupen- 
dous changes of which one hears so much in the English 
and American Press. All along the railway, and espe- 
cially on the line between Tientsin and Peking, it seemed 
to me that the allowance of railway officials, military 
pohce, and casual loafers was even more generous than 
in the past. The various classes of passengers were much 
the same. Amongst the foreigners, more Japanese, per- 
haps, and fewer Germans; amongst the natives of the 
wealthier sort, a wider distribution of the hideous hybrid 
garments which are the outward and visible signs of 
" Western learning " ; but the bulk of the traffic, as of 
old, consisted of officials — conspicuous by their multi- 
tudinous baggage — sober, soHd citizens, of the small- 
trader class, and crowds of coolies and peasants, in blue- 
grey, cotton-padded garments, close-huddHng Hke cattle 
in the biting north wind. In the reserved coupes of the 
first-class corridor carriage, one perceived, as of old, the 
intangible, impassable barrier between East and West 
which no League of Nations can ever overcome; one 
realised, as of old, how artificial is the atmosphere of 
their demonstrative social relations. One felt also, with 
a recurrence of discomfort and distaste, the old vague 
sense of something furtive — a suspicion of undignified 
intrigues — ^in certain strange foregatherings of one's fellow- 
passengers, in whispered conferences of foreign Conces- 
sionaires and Chinese officials, and in the latter's inability 
or reluctance to distinguish between a Chevalier de la 
Legion d'honneur and a Chevalier d' Industrie. 

One fellow-traveller I met on this journey of a type 



NORTHWARD THROUGH SHANTUNG 277 

new to me, a type that has emerged from the throes of 
the Revolution of 1911, to wit, a Chinese Member of 
ParHament. He was a native of Honan, and supporter 
of the Anfu faction, a big, burly specimen of the gentry 
class, thick of neck and loud of voice, but a shrewd 
fellow and affable withal. Seeing that he had no seat, 
I invited him to share my coupe, which he did with 
alacrity. For an hour or more he talked freely of men 
and affairs at the capital, and from his conversation I 
learned many things of the art of government, as prac- 
tised by Tuan Chi-jui and his friends. Of the outside 
world and of the meaning of representative government, 
he had no clearer idea than had his forefathers of the 
Han dynasty, and his description of the position and 
duties of a Member of Parliament was such as to make 
one sympathise with Yuan Shih-k'ai's CromweUian method 
of dealing with that amorphous assembly. After a while, 
wearying of academic talk, he put his feet up, covered 
himself with a plush rug, and promptly went to sleep; 
and as he slept, he snored, and his snoring was even as 
the bull of Bashan, an incredible uproar of snorts and 
gasps and grunts, which speedily compelled me to leave 
him in undisturbed possession of the coupe for the rest 
of the journey. At the Chien Men terminus we wished 
each other a cordial farewell, with expressions of mutual 
esteem. 

Say what you will. East is East. 



CHAPTER XVII 

PEKING IN 1920 

At the railway terminus, where the Tientsin evening 
express comes to rest in the shadow of the grim old waU 
by the Chien M^n, and you feel your way out, as of old, 
by the narrow path that leads through the water-gate 
to the Wagons-hts Hotel, the times and tides of revolution 
have wrought but little visible change in the familiar 
scene. Indeed, one's first feeling here, as in other Chinese 
cities (as distinct from the Treaty Ports), is a grateful 
and comfortable sense of the sound and sane stabihty 
of this people and a renewed appreciation of its abiding 
virtue in a world of change. And this feeling grows upon 
you the longer you stay in Peking, in spite of all the 
surface indications of modernism and undercurrents of 
unrest. Many things have happened, it is true, in the 
years that have gone since last we passed out by this 
same water-gate. The Dragon Throne no longer " sways 
the wide world " ; Yuan Shih-k'ai has been gathered to 
his fathers and a strange new flag floats over the Presi- 
dential Mansion in the Forbidden City. In the brand- 
new highways that lead to the modern-style Government 
offices, and in the Legation quarter, you will see dignitaries 
of State in motor-cars, wearing hideous shapeless 
foreign overcoats, who in bygone days used to ride in 
green palanquins with eight bearers. And in the even- 
ing, at a Waichiaopu dance, you may meet these same 
worthies, wearing dress clothes, all covered with stars 
and ribbons, and looking as if they had sold their birth- 
right of Oriental dignity for a mess of alien pottage. 
You may even see some of their wives, in fearful and 

278 



PEKING IN 1920 279 

wonderful garments, apeing the manners and customs of 
the barbarian, and you may hear much windy talk of the 
awakening of China and the dawn of the New Era. You 
may hire a motor-car which will drive you, over a well- 
metalled road, even unto the western hills; and they 
will show you aeroplanes and wireless telephones, and 
many other stalled white elephants of recent importa- 
tion, to prove that the Republic is keeping up to date 
and that the old business of Government contracts is as 
lucrative as ever. And you may see an imposing Marconi 
mast, rising from the grounds of the Japanese Legation 
(a new landmark which tells its own tale, for him that 
hath ears to hear), and many other signs and portents 
of change, poUtical and administrative. 

And yet, despite all these things, the impression which 
grows upon one and persists is that of the deep-rooted 
immutabihty of this wise old centre of the Chinese 
system. What, after all, are these straws on the shifting 
winds of change, compared with the abiding testimony 
which confronts you here on every side, in the monu- 
ments of the past and in the minds of men? Look 
down, over the Legation quarter, beyond the yellow roofs 
of the Imperial City, to the distant gates and guard- 
houses that mark the circumference of the city walls : 
except in the near foreground, where new buildings have 
replaced the devastations of the Boxers, all the old feng- 
shui, the haunts of countless tutelary gods, are undis- 
turbed. And even in the Legation quarter, with all its 
display of defensive battlements and glacis, there are 
many famihar sights and sounds to recall the days of 
Parkes and Wade, when the glamour of mystery and the 
tradition of vast power still lingered about the Dragon 
Throne and made it something of an adventure for a white 
man to Hve in the shadow of the Forbidden City. In 
the spacious grounds and beautiful old buildings of the 
British and French Legations, in the garden of the 
great " I.G.," in the general features of Legation Street, 
aye, even in the aspect of the deserted German " Fu," 



280 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

the passing years have left but little trace. At the 
British Legation the ting-chai, who takes your card with 
a broad smile of welcome, is the same man who took it, 
at the same door, thirty years ago. The old kan-men-ti 
at the Customs Inspectorate was guardian of this same 
gateway when to-day's Commissioners were students. 
The placid-faced old Shantung man, with his heavy 
bundle of silks and embroideries, is the same who sat 
patiently at your doorstep a generation ago. His goods, 
alas, are not what they used to be in pre-Boxer days, 
and before the silk-dyers learned the insidious uses of 
German anilines, but age has not withered nor custom 
staled this kindly soul's philosophy. As you wander 
through the narrower streets of the Tartar City and 
listen to the street vendors' clamour of beUs, gongs, and 
cymbals, and their long-drawn melodious cries, rising, 
far and near, hke an incense of homely lives; as you 
watch all sorts and conditions of humble workers doing 
the same thing, in the same place and the same way, 
that their forefathers did, you realise how meaningless, 
how far from the real Ufe of this ancient people, are the 
things of which the pohticians speak, how strong the 
ties that bind it to the past. You get an inkling of its 
quiet tenacity of purpose from the way in which it has 
steadily ignored the modernists' attempt to abolish the 
Chinese New Year festival and to adopt the Western 
calendar. Most of the poorer classes of Peking's inhabi- 
tants have " eaten bitterness " more than once since 
1900 ; their houses have been plundered, and their queues 
cut off, in the name of new and strange gods ; but 
neither revolutions nor Presidential Mandates can ever 
make them follow after these gods, or lead them to doubt 
the wisdom of their own ancestral ways. 

Higher up the scale also, amongst the literati and the 
new-style mandarins of the Parliament, if you look 
beneath the transparent surface of make-beheve Re- 
publicanism, you find continual evidence of the same 
" unbroken continuity of ancient traditions " in th© 



PEKING IN 1920 281 

grim struggle for place and pelf and patronage that goes 
on eternally about and around the seat of government. 
The outward and visible forms of authority are changed, 
but the character of the men who wield it and many of 
the men themselves remain the same as in the days of 
the great Tzu Hsi. Plus ga change, plus c'est la mime 
chose, or, to put it in the words of an Enghsh philosopher, 
" from the upheaval of a revolution the old shibboleths 
emerge, with new men to utter them." The Dragon 
Throne has disappeared in the turmoil, even as dynasties 
have gone down in the past, but all the essential features 
of the inveterate struggle are even as the laws of the 
Medes and Persians. The names and war-cries of the 
partisans are altered, but their methods remain the same 
as they were in the days of the Hans and the Mings. 
The uncertainty and unrest which have disturbed the 
seats of the mighty ever since Young China grasped its 
chance at the time of the Manchu debacle, the atmosphere 
of treasons, stratagems, and spoils that has since pervaded 
the headquarters of government at Peking and in the 
provinces, all these are nothing new in the history of 
China; they are merely symptomatic of the periodical 
paroxysms which occur whenever the strong hand of 
authority is relaxed, for lack of the right kind of ruler. 
To-day, because the people are as sheep without a shep- 
herd, the struggle for supremacy between ambitious 
chieftains and their rival factions goes on, just as it 
did in the days of the Three Kingdoms ; but its leaders 
have acquired a new sort of " world sense " and a very 
shrewd idea of the value of modem catchwords, which 
have provided new and effective war-cries for their 
essentially sordid strife. For the benefit of the gallery 
overseas, they shout lustily about Constitutions, Pariia- 
ments, and militarism. But whether the leading figures 
be Sun Yat-sen and Tang Shao-yi, Yuan Shih-k'ai and 
Liang Shih-jd, Chang Hsiin and the old brigade, Tuan 
Chi-jui and the Anfu Club, or Chang Tso-hn and the 
Chihli faction, the causes and results of the strife are 



282 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

ever the same, and must remain so until, by process of 
exhaustion, a new ruler shall emerge strong enough and 
wise enough to govern the country as it needs and asks 
to be governed, that is to say, by a benevolent form of 
despotism which shall conform to the Confucian tradi- 
tions, and by virtue of institutions adapted to the struc- 
tural character and genius of the race. It is surely 
significant to note that all the " elder statesmen," whose 
names command a measure of respect amidst the tumult 
of the swashbucklers and the word-spinners, are men 
whose sympathies have been unmistakably identified 
with the maintenance of the Confucian system and 
the patriarchal order of government. The deep-rooted 
prestige of the orthodox literati is sufficiently indicated 
by Hsii Shih-chang's occupancy of the Presidential 
Mansion, for this venerable ex- Viceroy is not only an 
avowed Monarchist, but, like Yuan Shih-k'ai, he believes 
implicitly in the moral superiority of China's pohtical 
system over that of the West. Like the great Empress- 
Dowager, he cannot conceive of any sound statesmanship 
professing to ignore the " three fundamental bonds and 
the five moral obhgations," which are the permanent 
foundations of the Chinese social edifice, " as the sun and 
moon, for ever enlightening the world." And this same 
faith is held, deep down in their hearts, by those who 
lead their factions to fight in the name of a still-born 
Constitution or a lawless Parhament, by the hungry 
office-seekers of the capital and the satraps of the pro- 
vinces. Even amongst the younger men there are signs 
of a reaction in favour of the classical tradition. 

Another feature wherein the present-day mandarins 
conform to the old-established tj^e is their individual 
and collective timidity in the face of any public agitation 
or partisan attack. Nothing has emphasised this char- 
acteristic of the ruling class more forcibly than the 
pitiful collapse of the Government, when the students 
of the capital and of Shanghai raised their clamour 
for the dismissal of Tsao Ju-lin and his pro- Japanese 




CAMELS RESTING, PEKING. 




A CAMEL TRAIN FROM THE WESTERN HILLSj PEKING. 



PEKING IN 1920 283 

colleagues in the Cabinet. The fear which overtook the 
tajen of the Ministries when the students vented their 
feelings by burning Tsao's house was obviously panic, 
due to atavistic causes that are bred in the very bones 
of the East, the rich man's fear for the loss of his hoarded 
wealth. Let there fall but a shadow of sudden tumult 
or alarm, and the mandarin's first instinct is to concihate 
and to temporise, whilst he seeks a place of safety for 
his family and his portable possessions. The students' 
strike and demonstrations were quelled, and the turbulent 
youths placated, by a make-believe dismissal of the 
offending Ministers, with the immediate result that, all 
over the country, the babes and sucklings of the Mission 
schools were led to consider themselves as a power in the 
land. But before a serious crisis of poUtical disturbance, 
such as General Chang Hsiin's brief restoration of the 
Manchu dynasty in July 1917, or the Anfu Club's fight 
for supremacy last August, when the issues at stake are 
likely to lead to armed conflict and promiscuous looting, 
the ruling passion of the mandarin expresses itself, rapidly 
and by common consent, in movement of heavy-laden 
carts from all parts of the city to the shelter of the Lega- 
tion quarter. How many times, I wonder, have Na 
Tung's gold bars and Hu Wei-te's curios found refuge in 
the sanctuary which the Boxer colleagues of these worthies 
did their best to destroy in 1900? At such times of 
tumult, the foreign Banks and the Wagons-lits Hotel 
became literally safety-vaults for the officials' wealth. 
It is a strange commentary on the chaotic condition of 
China under the Republic, that the very same officials 
who profess to share Young China's enthusiasm for the 
recovery of " sovereign rights " and the abolition of 
extra-territoriality are the first to fly for safety to the 
protection of the Legation guards. As a place of residence 
for Chinese millionaires en retraite, Peking, in spite of 
these guards and of its social and lucrative opportunities, 
is not as fashionable as Shanghai or Tientsin ; and it is 
safe to say that if it were not for the sanctuary available 



284 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

in the Legation quarter, a good many of those who now 
labour for (or against) the State would not face the risks 
of official life at the capital. 

As regards the political activities of the student class, 
I found amongst foreigners in close touch with them 
(notably the American Y.M.CA.) a general tendency to 
regard the movement as genuinely spontaneous and 
proof of the increasing national consciousness and patriot- 
ism of the rising generation as a whole and of the " Western- 
learning " contingent in particular. One earnest Y.M.CA. 
worker, with whom I witnessed and discussed the great 
procession of boy and girl politicians last January at 
Peking, to protest against the proceedings of Japan in 
Shantung, was of opinion that the final result of these 
demonstrations would be good, inasmuch as they would 
tend to increase the officials' and parliamentarians' sense 
of direct responsibility to the people. There were 
several thousands of youths and girls in this procession, 
carrying cloth bannerets, distributing handbills, and 
shouting their war-cries in unison to the word of com- 
mand of their leaders. It was a very docile and decorous 
crowd, even though one of its war-cries called for the 
blood of Yang I-te, the Chief of Pohce at Tientsin ; and 
the girls seemed to display a more lively enthusiasm than 
the boys. With a sincere desire to be persuaded, I could 
find nothing in this pathetic demonstration to differentiate 
it from many other manifestations of Young China's 
fitful fever : the undisciplined, emotional quality which 
is so characteristic of the Western-educated youth of 
the Orient has always sought and found expression in 
these solemn processions and long-winded protests. It 
was true ten years ago, and it remains true to-day, that, 
given the stimulus of the sense of movement en masse, 
with waving of flags and beating of drums, the moral 
support of foreign teachers and sympathisers, and the 
applause of the native Press, the Chinese student class is 
capable of developing a swift-spreading contagion of 
semi-hysterical excitement and violent activity. But 



PEKING IN 1920 285 

never in all these years has any movement of this kind 
revealed the existence of deep-rooted political convictions 
or any serious purpose of constructive effort. The student 
agitation of last year, on the subject of the Japanese 
question in Shantung, merely served to frighten the 
mandarins at Peking, without in any way advancing 
China's position in regard to that question ; and it failed, 
as usual, to denounce the official corruption, which 
obviously constitutes the chief obstacle to the satis- 
factory solution of this, or any other, national problem. 
It is all a shadow-play of words against a background 
of delusive dreams, and for the persistence of these 
dreams the West is chiefly responsible. 

Later on, in Tientsin, a new and sordid complexion was 
cast upon certain of the activities of the student agitators, 
or at all events of the organisers of these demonstrations 
in the north. Documentary evidence was secured by 
the poHce which showed that the movement had been 
organised and financed by the political opponents of Tuan 
Chi-jui and the Anfu Club. The Chief of PoUce informed 
me that, according to the evidence in his possession, a 
sum of $200,000 had been subscribed out of the funds 
of the late Vice-President (Feng Kuo-chang) for the 
purpose of stirring up agitation against the Government, 
and the North China Daily Mail declared that even 
foreigners had received payment from this fund to assist 
in these " spontaneous " manifestations of poHtical 
consciousness ! 

In its main thoroughfares of trade and traffic Peking 
presents an appearance of animation and prosperity, 
combined with a very marked improvement in civic 
administration. Considering the general state of unrest 
that has prevailed since the Revolution, and all the 
alarms and excursions that the capital has experienced; 
remembering the condition of Ustless destitution in which 
its citizens Uved and moved in the years following the 
havoc of the Boxers, one is agreeably surprised at the 



286 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

city's air of cheerful well-being, at the excellence of its 
roads, the smart appearance of the police, the liveliness 
of trade in its marts and markets, and the generally 
comfortable appearance of the man in the street. Indeed, 
in the main artery of traffic, that runs from the railway 
terminus at the Chien Men to the heart of the city, it is 
only the broad outlines that remind one of the Peking 
of pre-Boxer days. The old-time scavengers are gone — 
the gaunt pigs, famished dogs, and human gatherers of 
offal that used to scour the noisome streets and garbage 
heaps of old; gone are the human scarecrows that used 
to lay the dust with the overflow of the sewers ; and gone, 
or almost gone, the sorrowful army of maimed and leprous 
beggars that cried for alms in the gates of the city and 
on the outskirts of the temples. The old, springless cart, 
with its powerful Szechuan mule and the high, narrow 
wheels that cut the roads to ribbons, is vanishing fast, 
ousted by the automobiles of the great and by jinrickshas 
of innumerable types. I do not mean to suggest that, 
in the matter of smells and squalor, Peking is not still 
a very medieval spot, but there have been some very 
energetic new brooms at work in the past ten years, 
and some very effective spring-cleaning has been done. 
The improvements that have been made in the matter 
of roads alone prove that, given sufficient incentive and 
money, the Chinese are quite capable of collective effort 
and successful organisation in the public service. At 
Tsinanfu and Tainanfu you may see the same lesson writ 
large across two very ancient cities; in these matters, 
China's trouble lies not in discovering new sources of 
useful energy, but only in maintaining their output. 
Thus, for example, the Peking police have been well 
disciplined and kept up to the mark, by common consent 
of a very nervous bureaucracy, ever since Yuan Shih-k'ai's 
troops looted the houses of the parliamentary delegates 
in February 1912, and the machinery for checking crimes 
against property is at present a great deal swifter and 
more drastic than in the old days of the Board of Punish- 



PEKING IN 1920 287 

ments. The police have a Chief whose methods for 
discouraging lawlessness and looting are quiet but very 
effective. On the 29th of January, 1920, for instance, 
it came to my knowledge accidentally that eleven men 
had been shot that morning, without other formahty 
than orders from headquarters, having been taken red- 
handed in some bandit or burglary business. 

But good roads and a " loyal " police force mean 
pubHc funds, and prosperous shopkeepers mean buyers 
with money in their purses, and one wonders at first sight 
from whence has come all this money to the capital, in 
these days of truculent provincial Tuchuns, who decHne 
to render unto Caesar that which used to be his. But 
the explanation is simple enough. The money which has 
given to Peking this unexpected air of well-being and 
vivacity has been raised chiefly by pohticians for poHti- 
cians, and much of it is lavishly spent by the parhamentary 
supporters of the faction which happens to be in control 
of the Boards of Revenue and Communication — the two 
milch cows of national finance. The five years of the 
Great War were very fat years for China, years in which 
the value of her silver currency was trebled and her 
indemnity payments remitted, whilst the balance of 
profitable trade brought a vast amount of money into 
the country. The Government's immediate liabihties 
were greatly reduced and its revenues increased. These 
were years, in fact, when, had there been anything of 
genuine patriotism or statesmanship in Cabinet or Parlia- 
ment, China might well have put her financial house in 
order. But not all the treasures of Golconda could have 
satisfied the rapacity of the mihtary freebooters and 
carpet-bag politicians who gathered in their thousands to 
batten on the public purse. The Customs and salt sur- 
pluses, railway revenues and other sources of normal 
income were merely appetisers to this hungry horde. 
From Japan, in return for promissory notes and conces- 
sions (that are likely to cost the nation dear) came a 
steady stream of loans and subsidies which went, for the 



288 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

most part, to fatten the henchmen of the Anfu Club, who 
formed the majority of Parhament, and all the locust 
swarm of the fast -swelling bureaucracy. These were days 
of easy money, when, amidst the clash of factions, the 
price of a vote in the House of Representatives soared 
from the hundreds to the thousands (as when Tsao 
Kun was an aspirant for the Vice-Presidency), and, if 
report speaks truly, a great deal of this money has been 
spent in the fashionable shops and tea-houses of the 
Chien M^n quarter, to the enriching of thrifty citizens. 
Even so the whirhgig of Time brings in his revenges, and 
the locusts give back the years that the locust has eaten. 

In these days, when Young China and many of its 
well-meaning friends talk volubly of " sovereign rights," 
it is worth remembering that very few cities in the land 
have escaped outbreaks of lawlessness and looting since 
the Revolution, except those in which the foreigner and 
his vested interests are protected by the display of force. 
Had it not been for the presence of the Legations and the 
forces at their command, Peking would hardly have 
escaped rough treatment at the hands of the rabble armies 
of the contending factions in one or other of the several 
crises that have occurred since 1912. And even with the 
protection which the city derives from the prestige and 
potential power of the Legations, the presence of these 
hordes of undisciplined troops, whose pay is always in 
arrears, is a constant cause of unrest, which readily takes 
the form of sudden panics. When rumours and alarm 
signals are flying, the thought of these unruly masses of 
marauders, loosely held in leash, is ever in the minds of 
peace-loving householders, and at the first whisper of 
armies on the move, the trains for Tientsin are filled with 
crowds of timid citizens and there is much burying of 
treasure by night. The amount of gold and silver and 
valuables which lies " cached " around and about Peking 
to-day is said by the Chinese themselves to be much larger 
than the secret hoards of pre-Boxer days. 

Discussing this matter of hoarding, a banker of wide 



PEKING IN 1920 289 

experience informed me that the marked growth of this 
tendency is directly traceable to the slim financial methods 
of the bureaucracy, and particularly to the banking opera- 
tions of the Chiaotung clique. The old-fashioned trust- 
worthy native banks in private hands have been almost 
completely frozen out by the new-style Government 
Banks, of whose methods it need only be said that most 
of their notes are quoted at heavy discounts (50 per cent, 
and over), and that the average prudent citizen is not 
disposed to entrust his sycee to their safe keeping. There- 
fore the hoarding habit has steadily grown, and a vast 
quantity of silver has thus been withdrawn from circula- 
tion. During the War, this helped to send up the 
market price of silver (in January 1920 the Tientsin 
tael touched ten shillings), and this, in turn, seriously 
handicapped China's export trade. 

As illustrating the condition of affairs in the Tuchuns' 
armies, and how the fear of them is carried and spread 
by swift -footed rumour, a certain visit paid to Peking by 
the Tuchun of Jehol in January was instructive. A fine 
specimen of the old-style Chinese mihtary commander 
is Tuchun Chiang, of the northern marches, a veteran 
standing six feet in his socks, who fought with Gordon 
against the Taipings, and a genial warrior withal. He 
attended a reception at the British Legation, and brought 
with him not only the flavour of picturesque old days and 
ways, which is becoming sadly rare under the Republic, 
but also a suggestion of something premonitory, a whisper- 
ing wind of warning. His troops, he declared, had had 
no pay for seven months, and he had come to Peking to 
get money for them from the Ministry of War, or know 
the reason why. If it were not forthcoming, there was 
" big trouble " ahead. When I spoke of this distinguished 
visitor to a Chinese merchant who prides himself on 
knowing a good deal about wheels within wheels in the 
north, he smiled and said it was quite true that the Jehol 
troops had not been paid for a long time, and were becom- 
ing mutinous, but common report had it that for months 
u 



290 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

past the Tuchun had been burying a large amount of 
sycee. It is probably safe to say that the twenty-two 
Tuchuns between them have squeezed enough in the last 
five years to balance the national budget for the next ten, 
and that, among all these self-determined satraps, only one 
or two (notably the Tuchun of Shansi) have shown them- 
selves just and patriotic rulers of the " stupid people." 

Another manifestation of the lawless activities of the 
"licentious soldiery " is their barefaced trade in contra- 
band opium, conducted under the protection of their 
chiefs. There are many curious features about the opium 
traffic in Chitia to-day, from Canton to Kirin, but none 
more curious than the brisk business in the drug openly 
conducted at the capital, not by the opium-shops (for 
these were suppressed long ago to the sound of moral 
drums and virtuous trumpets), but by officials, civil and 
military. As I ventured to predict in 1912, to the great 
scandal of all true behevers, the " opium-abolition " 
movement has put an end to the bona fide importation of 
the Indian drug and checked the transit trade in all its 
former channels, merely to divert it into new ways, more 
directly profitable to the mandarin. In January of last 
year you could buy as much native opium as you wished 
in Peking for $7 an ounce, and Indian opium at $12, 
and it was commonly reported in the city that the bulk 
of the supply came from Moukden, brought in by the 
soldier emissaries of the great Tuchun, Chang Tso-lin, 
and regularly controlled from his agents' offices. 

Calling one day at a curio-shop in the Soochow hutung 
to ask after the proprietor, an old friend of former days, 
I learned that he had died the year before, and from his 
eldest son I gathered that excessive opium-smoking, after 
seven years of abstinence, was chiefly responsible for his 
death. I also learned that the anti-opium movement had 
become to all intents and purposes a dead letter. When I 
inquired how the father had been able to procure the drug, 
his son replied that any one who had the money could 
purchase it from the officials at any time. It came from 



4 



t 




B. T. Pridecm.\ 



MILLET (KAO LIANG) IN OCTOBER. 




ON THE FROZEN PEIHO, TIENTSIN OLD-STYLE LOCOMOTION AND NEW. 



PEKING IN 1920 291 

the north [k'ou wai), he said, brought over the border by 
Russians and Japanese, most of the drug being grown in 
Manchuria and Kansuh. Later on, at Moukden, I saw 
something of the machinery of this traffic in working — 
a dozen evil-looking Russian women of the PoUsh-Jew 
type, breakfasting at the Yamato Hotel, on their way 
through from Harbin to Dalny, opium and morphia 
smugglers all. And Japan's " self-determined " parcel 
post is another important factor in the situation. 

Ignoring the fact that opium is grown in many parts of 
the country with the obvious connivance of officials, and 
that the trade is conducted at many centres under official 
auspices, a section of Young China's mandarins has 
recently drawn the usual red herring across the opium 
trail and endeavoured to make the corrupt traffic serve 
the purposes of its campaign for the abolition of extra- 
territoriality. In former days, when its first object was 
to get rid of the competition of the Indian opium trade. 
Young China and the foreign Anti-Opium Societies used 
to declare that China could and would abolish opium 
completely, when once the Indian importation had been 
stopped. Thanks chiefly to the fervent propaganda of 
the sentimentalists and " uplifters " in England and 
America, the Indian trade was abolished, and forthwith 
opium-growing and smuggling became one of the man- 
darins' most lucrative sources of income. The fact is 
notorious and undeniable; at missionary meetings to- 
day it is either passed over in sad silence or treated as a 
lamentable case of backsliding. But the section of Young 
China to which I refer sees nothing lamentable in the 
situation. On the contrary, it is now urging the senti- 
mentalists and the uphfters to beheve and to preach that 
the opium traffic will be finally abohshed if once the 
foreigners' rights of extra-territoriahty are given up ; 
and already there are indications of a widespread propa- 
ganda developing along these lines. At a banquet follow- 
ing the meeting of the Anti-Narcotic Society in Tientsin 
in January of last year, Mr. Huang (educated in America), 



292 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

Director of the Bureau of Foreign Affairs, made a typical 
speech, in which he declared that China could not be 
expected to deal properly with the opium and morphia 
trades until she had recovered her political autonomy. 
Thanks to the loose thinking, bred of facile catchwords 
which prevails in England and America, the " sovereign 
rights recovery " movement is now making considerable 
progress, for the reason that it is not in the nature of the 
earnest idealist to allow the melancholy experience of 
yesterday to check his enthusiasm for the Utopia of to- 
morrow. To any one who knows anything about China, 
the idea of putting an end to opium by abohshing the 
foreigners' extra-territorial rights is grimly humorous, 
but, unfortunately, many of the good people who share 
Mr. President Wilson's illusions about the world of men 
have no knowledge of the East and but little sense of 
humour. And Mr. Huang, despite his dress-clothes, has 
both. 

There were many new features of interest in the pictur- 
esque pageant of hfe at Peking as I saw it last year, 
many lights and shadows suggestive of coming events, 
but few more significant, as straws on the wind, than the 
pillar-boxes of the Imperial (and quite independent) 
Japanese Post, dotted about aU over the capital. Japan's 
" conquest by post " throughout all the regions of the 
North is a very real and a very insidious business, more 
seriously injurious to China's revenues and sovereign 
rights than, shall we say, her hold on Kiaochao : yet the 
Chinese authorities and Press patriots seem to see nothing 
particularly derogatory to their dignity in a proceeding 
which asserts " concession " privileges at the very heart 
of government. When I spoke on the subject to Mr. 
Liang Shih-yi, the great wirepuller in chief, he said that 
the Government had protested against these sign-posts of 
the Rising Sun's ascendancy, but the Japanese Minister 
had paid no attention, and what more could they do? 
The boycott was evidently foredoomed to failure. 



PEKING IN 1920 293 

At the Wagons-lits Hotel, such signs of change as one 
observes are suggestive of Europe in the melting-pot 
rather than of China in transition. At the Saturday- 
night dances, where diplomacy unbends, one sees a 
sprinkling of Chinese, and now and then some spirit, bolder 
than the rest, will defy his ancestral gods by "posturing 
with a female to the sound of horns " ; but the crowd of 
jazzers (far more numerous than in pre-war days) seems 
to be chiefly composed of Americans, most of them good, 
healthy-looking youngsters of the clean-run breed that 
one finds now in many an outpost of the Standard Oil, 
the British-American Tobacco Co., and the Y.M.C.A. It 
was, of course, to be expected that American interests in 
China would rapidly expand during the first four years 
of the war, and before the States came into the struggle ; 
nevertheless, some of the manifestations of this expansion 
are surprising, and one does not get used to them very 
readily, because all one's memories of Peking are some- 
how opposed to the idea that haste and hustle can ever 
be possible within these old grey walls. In the same way 
one cannot get quite accustomed to the silent places that 
used to be humming hives of German activity in these 
parts ; there is something almost ominous in the solitudes 
that were the Legation and the Deutsch-Asiatische 
Bank. 

The stretch of the city wall which lies between the 
Chien Mgn and the Hata Gate, ever memorable for the 
Legations' grim struggle with the Boxers, remains, as of 
old, the spot where the foreigner takes his constitutional 
in dignified seclusion, no Chinese being allowed to intrude 
thereon. Here, of an afternoon, you may see the pillars 
of many States discussing the destinies of nations and the 
latest gossip of the diplomatic world. Beneath, the 
distant aspect of the city, with its wide expanse of low 
buildings screened by trees, where the yellow roofs of the 
Palace and the great towers of the main gates gUsten and 
glow in the setting sun, is much the same scene as the 
European gazed upon when first the armies of the Western 



294 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

barbarian camped yonder on the Anting plain. Close 
under the wall, to the southward, the canal runs, as of 
yore, still flanked by garbage heaps, stinking to heaven ; 
beyond the railway line you may catch a glimpse of 
camel-trains, slowly wending their wonted way towards 
the western hills. From the marts and markets of the 
Chien M^n quarter rises the vague murmur of innumerable 
buyers and sellers, and in the distance, to the north-west, 
a little yellow cloud tells of the coming of a sand-laden 
wind. Everything in the distance is unchanged; it is 
only here, beside us on the wall, that one is reminded of 
time and the hour, and of all the things that have hap- 
pened to China since first we trod these ancient weather- 
beaten bricks. Here you see a group of ItaUan airmen, 
beautiful creatures all covered with medals, pleasantly 
engaged for some weeks past in killing time (not to speak 
of ladies) while they wait for the much-advertised coming 
of d'Annunzio. And here are two interesting specimens 
of the youngest of Young China, recently returned from 
an American University with nice young American wives. 
There is nothing particularly new or strange in this 
particular manifestation of the results of Western learn- 
ing, and the pathos of it is an old story : 

Alas, regardless of their doom, the little victims play ! 

To-day, arm in arm, they walk upon the wall, with eyes 
that see not, strangers to both the worlds in which they 
move, but dimly feeling already their inevitable destiny 
of tragic isolation. Ten years hence, no doubt, she will be 
back in God's Own Country, with a working knowledge 
of the East, and he will be the centre of an Oriental menage 
on the patriarchal system. For East is East and West 
is West, and if, in the false dawn, they seem to meet, 
before the sun sets each must go his destined way. For 
such is the law, pre-ordained. 



CHAPTER XVIII 

AN EMPEROR IN WAITING 

To the north of the Tartar City in Peking, not far from 
the old Drum Tower, there hes a httle quartier of quiet 
streets where, despite all the alarms and upheavals of 
the past twenty years. Time seems to have stood still. 
The placid stream of life that flows through this secluded 
backwater reminds one very vividly of the Peking of 
bygone days, the city of dreadful dust and splendid dreams, 
whose mysterious charm lingers with such imperishable 
fragrance in the treasure-house of memory. A few children 
flying kites or playing in the shade of ancient trees, a 
few timid-faced women bargaining with the vegetable- 
sellers at their doors; little groups of gatemen and ser- 
vants gathered about the entrance of a tajen's residence ; 
and here and there an old-fashioned springless mule 
cart, with its driver slumbering contentedly on the shaft. 
Strangely quiet, these old streets; there are no shops 
to break the grey line of high, windowless walls, that 
enclose invisible courtyards and gardens, and the deep- 
eaved, sloping roofs of houses, all built to one design. 
Only from time to time the long-drawn cry of some hawker 
on his rounds, the tinkling cymbals of the beancurd seller, 
or the reedy flute of an itinerant chiropodist, breaks on 
the unfrequented silence, and lures the children from their 
noiseless games. Time was, when these streets were the 
abode of wealth and fashion, when many of the men 
who own these houses were snug and prosperous digni- 
taries, battening on the bounty that flowed from the 
Dragon Throne, for this was, and still is, essentially 
a Manchu quarter, as you may know by the curious head- 

295 



296 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

gear of the women at their doors. But to-day the glory 
of the Great Inheritance has faded, and with it, in many 
cases, has gone the livelihood of men who, bred to a birth- 
right of sheltered ease, are quite incapable of earning one. 

Faded, but not utterly departed, the glory that once 
was the Manchu dynasty. For, as all the world knows, 
the " Lord of Ten Thousand Years," though shorn of 
much pomp of majesty and power, still sits upon the 
Dragon Throne; and, as all the world knows also, only 
the hour and the Man are needed to restore to the allegiance 
of the Son of Heaven most of the men who now prudently 
profess and caLll themselves Republicans. They know, 
the dwellers in these quiet streets, that in every house 
throughout the city, a Dragon flag lies folded away — 
were they not all unfolded to the breeze, for one brief 
week, only three years ago? They know that the 
President of the Republic was a Grand Secretary by the 
grace of Her Majesty the " Old Buddha," and that, 
rdnce her passing, he has ever been a very faithful Guardian 
of the Heir-Apparent ; they know that every high official 
in Peking, having been a party to the restoration scheme 
of 1917, may be so again at any moment. Is it not freely 
rumoured that the Son of Heaven is to be married to 
President Hsii's daughter, the Imperial Clan consenting, 
and that, by this " harmonious fusion," the way wiU be 
prepared for the re-establishment of the Throne, as a 
limited, constitutional, and truly national Monarchy? 

To the European mind, such a solution of China's 
pohtical problems may seem fantastic; nevertheless, 
seriously considered, it is no more fantastic than the fact 
that the Emperor still remains part of the recognised 
order of things, in the vicinity of, and in close touch 
with, the Presidential Mansion; and that, within the 
narrow Hmits of the Forbidden City, the daily life of his 
court, with all its wonted privileges, dignities, and cere- 
monies, pursues the even tenor of immemorial usage. 
A Republic, with an Emperor held in reserve as part of 
the established order of things, and treated with all due 



AN EMPEROR IN WAITING 297 

deference by the powers that be, may strike the European 
as an impossible arrangement ; yet it is eminently char- 
acteristic of that instinct of the Chinese race-mind which 
is always opposed to finahty, either in politics or business. 
It is a fundamental principle in Chinese statecraft (which 
Young China obeys just as implicitly as its forefathers) 
never to burn its boats, to leave loopholes for compromise 
and adjustment, and to allow for the contingencies of 
inevitable reaction. 

It is to be remembered that the Manchu Dynasty has 
never definitely abdicated ^ and that the Imperial Decree 
establishing the Republic was the work of two famous 
Chinese officials, both of whom were convinced that the 
institution of a Republic in China could only mean " the 
instability of a rampant democracy, of dissension and 
partition." The subsequent maintenance of the Emperor 
as the acknowledged head of the subsidised Imperial Clan 
is therefore not only expHcable, but thoroughly consistent 
with every principle of mandarin statecraft. Consistent 
also with the workings of the race-mind, which clings 
instinctively to the unbroken continuity of ancient 
traditions, have been the arrangements made by the 
" Republican " authorities for the dignity and comfort of 
the Manchu Emperor and his Court, and the respectful 
attitude maintained towards His Majesty by all concerned, 
from the President downwards. In the seclusion of his 
Palace, surrounded by his Manchu and Chinese tutors, his 
Ministers and Chamberlains, His Majesty maintains all the 
time-honoured ceremonial of the Imperial Court, enjojdng 
" due courtesy, not fealty and obedience " (as a Presi- 
dential Mandate puts it), from his former subjects. 

This " due courtesy " and the attitude of metropoHtan 
officialdom towards the Throne, were very significantly 
displayed after General Chang Hsiin's serio-comic attempt 
to restore the Throne, for his own ends, by a coup d'etat 
in July 1917. Those who follow events in China will 
remember that, without warning, and certainly without 

1 Vide Recent Events and Present Policies in China, pp. 170, 178. 



298 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

connivance on his part, the Emperor was compelled by 
Chang Hsiin to resume the Throne, that for a week Edicts 
were issued in his name and the Dragon Flag waved once 
more over the Forbidden City. But when the little plot 
had come to its inglorious end, and Chang Hsiin's forces 
had been sent home (with full pay and the honours of 
war), no word was heard against the Emperor, either at 
Peking or in the provinces. On the contrary, the Govern- 
ment of the Repubhc went out of its way to express its 
respectful regrets to His Majesty that his seclusion should 
have been invaded and his peace disturbed, by the 
reprehensible prdceedings of an ambitious schemer. No 
monarch could ask for a more deferential expression of 
sympathy from his loyal subjects, and His Majesty's 
reply was couched in terms equally appropriate to the 
delicate situation. Delicate it certainly was, for all 
North China was aware that nearly every high ofi&cial in 
Peking was a party to the scheme for the restoration of 
the Throne, and that the miscarriage of General Chang's 
plot was not due to any difference of opinion on this 
point, but only to his unwillingness to agree to a fair 
division of the spoils of office. 

When, by Decree of the Throne, the Chinese Republic 
was first proclaimed, the boy-Emperor was six years of 
age. To-day he is in his sixteenth year, and the question 
of his future is therefore becoming a matter of increasing 
concern, not only to his family, but to the venerable 
guardians of the Heir- Apparent, of whom Hsii Shih- 
Chang, President of the Repubhc, is one. Especially 
interesting and important is the problem of his marriage, 
which, if Imperial traditions be observed, must be decided 
before long. As already stated, the opinion is strongly 
held, and freely expressed in high official circles at Peking, 
that the best solution of China's political difficulties would 
be for the Imperial Clan to consent to His Majesty's 
marriage with the daughter of President Hsii. The 
underlying idea is, that if this were done, and the exclusive 
Houselaws of the Manchu dynasty thus abrogated by the 



AN EMPEROR IN WAITING 299 

marriage of the Emperor to a Chinese lady, the anti- 
dynastic movement in the South must lose such moral 
force as it now claims and the way be prepared for the 
re-establishment of the Monarchy Constitutional, hmited, 
and shorn of all the exclusive Manchu privileges. 

The reader will observe that I am speaking now of 
the opinion which prevails amongst the educated class of 
Chinese, and especially the literati of the old regime, in 
North China. So far as my observation goes, the 
"Western-learning " section of Young China which holds 
official positions at Peking, displays no violent opposition 
to this way of thinking. In the South, and especially 
amongst the vociferous section of students and journalists, 
which lives by and for political agitation in the shelter 
of the Treaty Ports, they will tell you that the restoration 
of the Throne is impossible, and that the Repubhc repre- 
sents a genuine expression of the people's fixed will. 
Times being as they are, theirs are the opinions which 
reach and impress England and America; nevertheless, 
I have no hesitation in saying that they are wrong, 
and that the movement for the restoration of the Throne 
will eventually have the hearty approval of the vast 
majority of the people. They will welcome it, not only 
because the Dragon Throne has been for ages an essential 
part of the Confucian system, inseparable from the ideas 
of an agricultural race born and bred on patriarchal 
Theism, but also because of the callous corruption and 
disorder with which the present administration has become 
identified all over the country. And this approval will 
be strengthened as public opinion gradually comes to learn 
that the young Emperor is not only gifted with a very 
high order of intelligence, but that his education has been 
such as to lead him to break completely with the pre- 
judices and delusions of the past. Those who know him 
best speak enthusiastically of his abihties, of his lofty 
conception of duty, and of his desire to play a man's part 
in hfe. Like the late unfortunate Emperor Kuang Hsii, 
it is his earnest wish to be active in the work of constitu- 



300 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

tional reform and to identify himself with the true welfare 
and progress of the Chinese people. It is also his keen 
ambition to be allowed to complete his education by travel 
in Europe and America, and to be released from the 
fettering traditions of the past which confine him in the 
Forbidden City. 

During my recent visit to Peking, I was fortunate in 
making the acquaintance of Mr. R. F. Johnston, English 
tutor to His Majesty, and of learning from him much about 
the young Emperor's education and of life at the Imperial 
Court. Mr. Johnston is a distinguished scholar, an emi- 
nent authority on Buddhism and Chinese poetry, the 
author of From Peking to Mandalay, Buddhist China, and 
other well-lmown works. To visit him in his Chinese 
house, in that quiet little street near the Drum Tower 
which I have described, to hear him talk of his daily 
work and that of the Emperor's three other tutors, to 
get an intimate and vivid picture of present-day conditions 
in the Forbidden City — ^this was an experience well worth 
a long journey. There are people who declare that the 
romance of the East is dead and its glamour a delusion, 
that its high places have been invaded and desecrated 
by modern materiaUsm ; but the tale which Mr. Johnston 
told me, in the peaceful seclusion of an inner courtyard, 
amidst the miniature shrines and grottos of a little rock 
garden in the classical style, was, to my mind, as romantic 
in its way as anj^thing in Marco Polo's adventures or 
the memoirs of the Jesuit Fathers at the Court of Kanghsi. 
Indeed, there is something which appeals most powerfully 
to the imagination, in the presence of this English tutor 
in the Forbidden City, planting seeds of modern worldly 
wisdom in the mind of the Son of Heaven, whilst all about 
him the ancient ceremonial of the Court continues, 
mindful only of the venerated past. 

The reader may well wonder how and why Mr. Johnston 
ever came to become an Imperial Tutor in Peking, seeing 
that by profession he is a District Officer and Magistrate 
of the British " Leased Territory " of Weihaiwei. The 



m 




THE NOKTH1;kN railway approach to PEKING. 







UNDER THE WALLS OF PEKING. 



AN EMPEROR IN WAITING 301 

story is interesting, because it aptly illustrates the 
curiously intimate relations which exist between the 
mandarins who govern China (even when they agree to 
manifest irreconcilable differences in public) and that 
" bias of class " which is stronger than any of their poHtical 
opinions. At the time of the anti-dynastic movement 
(which became republican by accident), in 1911, a number 
of officials who had acquired wealth under the old regime, 
and who had no love for the Cantonese clique, sought 
security for themselves and their portable property in 
one or other of the Foreign Settlements. Several of 
those who belonged to the powerful Anhui faction, and 
had held high office under the Manchus, found a safe 
refuge, near to the capital, in Tientsin ; others established 
themselves in the German colony at Kiaochao or on British 
territory at Weihaiwei. Amongst the latter was Li 
Ching-mai, a younger son of the Viceroy Li Hung-chang, 
who resembles his famous father in combining progressive 
ideas with staunch adherence to the Imperialism of the 
orthodox literati; as Minister to Austria, and in other 
diplomatic missions under the monarchy, he had acquired 
a reputation for perspicacity and knowledge of foreign 
affairs. At Weihaiwei he made Mr. Johnston's acquaint- 
ance, and it was at his suggestion, evidently made with 
a shrewd eye for the probable course of events at Peking 
hereafter, that the present President of the RepubUc 
approved of the engagement of Mr. Johnston's services 
as tutor to His Majesty Hsiian Tung. The arrangement 
was sanctioned in due course by Sir John Jordan, on 
behalf of the British Government ; and Mr. Johnston, 
detached from duty at Weihaiwei, took up his duties at 
the Palace in 1918. 

The education of the young Emperor conforms strictly 
to the principles and precedents of the Confucian ethics 
and immemorial usage, every hour of his day being filled 
with its prescribed study, exercise, or recreation. Besides 
his Enghsh teacher, three other tutors are in regular 
attendance on His Majesty. His first lesson begins at 



302 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

6 a.m., when he studies the Chinese classics under the 
direction of Chen Pao-chen, a distinguished scholar and 
poet, who was an ardent supporter of the Emperor Kuang 
Hsii's programme of constitutional reform in 1898. The 
Emperor takes more kindly to his Chinese lessons than 
to those of his Manchu tutor, the inclination of his mind 
and sympathies being essentially Chinese, and at the same 
time progressive. It is the duty of the old Manchu Shih 
Hsii, as guardian of the Heir- Apparent, to instruct His 
Majesty in the language and literature of his forefathers. 
Shih Hsii achieved distinction in 1900 as a fanatical leader 
of the Boxer movement and a stiff-necked conservative. 
Since then his spirit has been chastened by the crowding 
misfortunes of the Imperial Clan ; in his old age he hves 
and moves, unconvinced but unprotesting, a picturesque 
and pathetic survival, in the diminished shadow of the 
Dragon Throne, doing his best to maintain its ceremonies 
and dignities. His feelings concerning the young Emperor 
amidst the wrack of the Republic are displayed by an 
attitude wherein courtesy struggles hard with conser- 
vatism, and wins a cheerless victory. He was strongly 
opposed to the idea of His Majesty learning English and 
to the intrusion of a barbarian into the sacred precincts ; 
but the fact being accomphshed, he has accepted it with 
courteous resignation, as one more buffet of outrageous 
fortune. Towards his fellow-tutors — even towards the 
foreigner — ^he displays the dignified courtesy which good 
manners demand ; for the rest, there are enough derelicts 
of the old Imperial Clan in and about the Palace to provide 
him with the consolations of congenial society. 

The third Imperial tutor is Chu I-fan, far-famed 
amongst the literati as a master of the science and art of 
caligraphy; from him the Emperor has acquired, with 
infinite dihgence, a style of penmanship which scholar 
experts sincerely praise for its distinction and classic 
elegance. Following the time-honoured custom of his 
ancestors. His Majesty takes pleasure in making ceremonial 
scroUs of characters penned and sealed with his own 



AN EMPEROR IN WAITING 303 

hand, which he bestows as birthday or New Year gifts 
upon his tutors and guardians and other meritorious 
persons. Amongst the treasures of Mr. Johnston's Hbrary 
are several of these marks of Imperial favour, together 
with a jade Ju-Yi (Chinese sceptre or baton) of exquisite 
workmanship. 

Towards all his tutors the young Emperor observes 
the respectful demeanour prescribed by the Confucian 
code — standing up whenever they enter or leave his 
presence, and addressing them with punctilious deference. 
On their birthdays, and at certain festivals, he sends 
congratulatory gifts to their homes, with all the ceremony 
prescribed by Imperial etiquette on such occasions. The 
arrival of a gift of melons from the Lord of Ten Thousand 
Years (" Wan Sui-Yeh," as the citizens of Peking still 
call him) creates a commotion, and much talk of bygone 
days, in the quiet neighbourhood of Mr. Johnston's house. 
At the four seasonal festivals, each tutor receives a sub- 
stantial present in money, a custom which dates back 
to very ancient times. 

All the Imperial tutors have the right (also prescribed 
by ancient usage) to ride in palanquins through the 
Imperial precincts, which, for the sake of " face " pre- 
servation, they do. Mr. Johnston is the healthy kind 
of man who would far rather walk than be carried by 
human beasts of burden in a sedan-chair, but he sub- 
ordinates his personal inclinations in this matter to the 
necessity for conforming to Oriental ideas of the dignity 
of an Imperial Tutor and the importance of maintaining 
that dignity intact in the eyes of the eunuchs and myr- 
midons of the Palace. The Emperor himself, after his 
lessons, returns to his private apartments in a yellow 
chair, borne by twenty attendants. 

Mr. Johnston gives the Emperor his lessons in the same 
apartment of the Chien Ching Kung (Palace of Heavenly 
Purity) where the iU-fated Kuang Hsii first learned and 
discussed the principles of constitutional government 
with the Cantonese scholar and iconoclast, Kong Yu-wei, 



304 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

and where he plotted with that visionary reformer to 
overthrow the power of the Empress-Dowager, A place 
of many memories and many vicissitudes is this stately 
Chien Ching Kung, where the grandson of Jung Lu, in 
company with Prince Tsai Tao's eleven-year-old son, 
now hstens respectfully to a foreigner expounding the 
elements of Western learning. It was in this Palace, 
curiously decorated with a profusion of foreign clocks, 
that, for the first time, the old Buddha penitent received 
the Diplomatic Body after her return to Peking in 1901. 
If her august shade should be permitted to revisit the 
ghmpses of the moon, to frequent the scenes which 
witnessed so many triumphs of her crowded life, to what 
depths of despond must that proud spirit be brought by 
the present humihation of her Imperial House ! 

Mr. Johnston describes the young Emperor as a lad of 
unusual intelligence and pleasant disposition, keenly 
interested in his studies and particularly in geography 
and foreign politics. He followed the negotiations of 
the Versailles Conference from day to day with critical 
attention, studying the course of events as described in 
the Chinese Press, by the aid of the best maps procurable, 
and asking questions which showed a remarkable grasp 
of the general situation. On one occasion, for example, 
he complained to Mr. Johnston that the boundaries of 
Luxembourg were not clearly shown on his map of 
Europe. His reading and talks with his English tutor 
have filled him with a keen desire to travel abroad, to 
see with his own eyes the wide world and all its wonders ; 
and the idea is being seriously and favourably discussed 
by those whose business it is to determine what things 
are lawful and expedient for His Majesty. The President 
of the Republic, Hsii Shih-chang (who, as guardian of 
the Heir-Apparent and a Monarchist by conviction, 
maintains cordial and intimate relations with His youth- 
ful Majesty), favours the proposal that he should proceed 
before long on a tour of Europe and America, incognito, 
and escorted by Mr. Johnston, Li Ching-Mai, and a small 



AN EMPEROR IN WAITING 305 

suite of personal attendants. This, and the question of 
the Emperor's marriage, are subjects of continual and 
serious discussion in the Palace. According to all 
dynastic precedents, the time is close at hand when 
his betrothal must be decided, so that if his wish to 
travel is to be fulfilled it cannot be much longer delayed. 
It is said that Prince Tsai Tao and other leaders of the 
Imperial Clan support the idea of the " harmonious 
fusion " marriage, and that it even meets with the 
resigned approval of the four old ladies of Kuang Hsii's 
Court and the aged Consort of Tung Chih, who, from 
their privacy " behind the screen," still play at Palace 
politics. If China were truly mistress in her own house, 
if the men who profess to guide the destinies of the 
Republic were not actually in bondage to their Japanese 
paymasters, it might, I think, be taken for granted that 
the young Emperor would before long be betrothed to 
the President's daughter, and that before his marriage 
he would be permitted to complete his education by 
travel abroad. But as matters stand, the nominal 
rulers of China can no more decide such matters for 
themselves than could Yuan Shih-k'ai when he was 
virtually Dictator. The ultimate destiny of His Majesty 
Hsiian Tung depends neither on the old gentlemen of 
the Presidential Mansion, nor on the old ladies of the 
Imperial Household, but on winged words spoken in 
the Secret Council Chamber of the Elder Statesmen of 
Japan. 

Meanwhile, maintained by the four-million-dollar 
allowance granted to the Imperial family by the makers 
of the Republic in 1912, the daily hfe of the Court within 
the narrow limits of the Forbidden City pursues the even 
tenor of its ancient ways. No longer may the Emperor 
leave the inner precincts to make stately progress through 
the Imperial and Chinese enclosures of the capital, and 
perform the solemn sacrifices of the summer and winter 
solstices at the Temple of Heaven. No longer may he 
invoke, on behalf of his people, the favour of the Divine 

X 



806 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

Husbandman at the Temple of Agriculture, or receive 
the homage-bearing envoys of tributary tribes. But 
within the precincts of the Forbidden City the elaborate 
ceremonial of his Court, with all its ordinances, ritual, 
and high-sounding titles, continues as of old. All about 
him, splendidly steadfast and unchanged, are the temples 
and palaces of his forefathers, monuments to the departed 
glories of Kang Hsi and Ch'ien Lung. All about him also 
are the Iron-capped Princes and the hereditary chieftains 
of the Eight Banners, picturesque but parasite survivals 
of a once warlike race. A considerable portion of the 
Republic's money-grant goes to the maintenance in 
listless idleness of three or four thousand of these Manchu 
pensioners, living either in the Tartar City or in the 
neighbourhood of the Imperial tombs. Last, but not 
least, the Chinese eunuchs of the old regime still infest 
the Palace to the number of a thousand or more, by all 
accounts worthy successors of the " rats and foxes " 
whose evil influence contributed so largely to the de- 
moralisation of Hsiian Tung's ancestors after the reign 
of Chia Ch'ing. 

The young Emperor's disposition and physique are 
healthy and normal, but even without the assistance of 
scheming Dowagers or treacherous Regents, danger must 
lurk in wait for him, danger of demoralisation and 
effeminacy, so long as these sleek rogues remain to 
practise their intrigues and insidious arts from the gate- 
keeper's lodge even unto the King's bedchamber. Mr. 
Johnston, indeed, regards the continued presence of these 
eunuchs in the Palace as the greatest of aU the dangers 
to which the young Emperor is exposed, and the history 
of the dynasty fully justifies this .^opinion. For, as all 
these crafty creatures know that their opportunities 
of acquiring wealth and power depend upon the de- 
moraUsation and weakness of their sovereign, they will 
lay their snares for him, even as their predecessors laid 
them for Hsien Feng and Tung Chih. 

On the occasion of Mr. Johnston's first appearance at 




PEKING : A LLAMA RITUAL. 




IN THE MANCHU QUARTER, PEKING. 



AN EMPEROR IN WAITING 307 

the Palace, the eunuchs, on the plea of " lao kuei-chu," 
or time-honoured custom, politely but firmly requested 
that he should pay his footing, to the tune of $150. But 
Mr. Johnston was equally firm in his determination to 
prove that the new Imperial Tutor represented new 
ideas, and that the gentle art of " squeezing " had no 
place in his curriculum. Knowing too much of Oriental 
ways to make them " lose face " and generate wrath- 
matter by a blunt refusal, he temporised and promised to 
bring the money on the following day. He brought it 
accordingly, but with it he tendered them for signature 
a receipt in duplicate, one copy for the President of the 
RepubUc and one for the British Minister. Chagrined 
by this departure from all classical precedent, the eunuchs 
withdrew their request; but before they departed the 
new tutor gave them in forcible vernacular a stern lecture 
on the evil of their ways. 

His Majesty Hsiian Tung is fond of exercise, but the 
restricted area of the Palace enclosure affords but little 
opportunity for gratifying his healthy inclinations. He 
rides occasionally, although there is but little joy in this 
form of exercise, as prescribed for him by the rigid con- 
servatism of the Court ; for an attendant leads his pony 
at a sedate pace round and round a stone-paved court- 
yard. Mr. Johnston hopes that His Majesty's guardians 
and advisers may be persuaded before long to allow him 
to take up his residence at the Summer Palace, where he 
would be less exposed to the demoralising influence of 
the eunuchs, and where he might learn to play tennis 
and get regular rowing exercise on the lake. The boy- 
Emperor himself longs for the freedom of wider space 
with all the eagerness of youth, gazing wistfully through 
the bars of his gilded cage upon the wide world, of which 
he has heard so much and seen nothing. 

He takes a boy's keen interest in all the mechanical 
inventions of the West, and shows serious apphcation 
in endeavouring to learn their principles and uses. When, 
in December, President Hsii Shih-chang asked Mr. 



308 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

Johnston to suggest suitable presents for him to send 
with his congratulations on the Emperor's birthday in 
February, Mr. Johnston asked his pupil for a list of the 
things that he would like to have. The first thing on 
His Majesty's list was a Corona typewriter, the use of 
which he proposed to learn. The Son of Heaven, tapping 
dutiful messages on a typewriter to the Dowager Consort 
of Tung Chih, is a picture calculated to disturb one's 
sense of the fitness of things, like the motor-cars which 
hoot and hustle through the once-sacred enclosure of the 
Tung Hua Men. But the East of the " Arabian Nights " 
is gone for ever , and the note of a Corona in the For- 
bidden City is but one of many whisperings of the winds 
of change. May the gods send them fortunate for His 
Majesty Hsiian Tung ! 



CHAPTER XIX 

THREE PALACES 1 

Revisiting the East after an absence of years, it 
seems to me as if all its splendid past and all its present 
discontents were recorded and symbolised in the Imperial 
Palaces of Peking, Seoul, and Tokyo. Of one race are 
they, these three, but each is beautiful with a distinctive 
beauty of its own. Stately and splendid, with the 
dignity of great simple things, each tells its own tale, 
that he who runs may read, of creeds and civilisations 
that have passed, like shadows on a wall. Silent and 
secluded, wrapped in their garments of departed great- 
ness, they stand, to the outward eye steadfast and un- 
changed, looking out on a troubled world of unfamiliar 
things and alien ways. Ten years ago, aU three were 
the habitations of Emperors, sacred spots from whose 
mysterious depths issued the Edicts, whereat men 
trembled and obeyed. To-day, the Son of Heaven and 
the Lord of the Morning Calm have gone their ways, to 
join the mournful company of Kings in exile. Only 
His Majesty of Tokyo remains, a dim, mysterious figure 
in the medieval seclusion of Chiyoda, a picturesque 
survival of old Japan, hke an idol in a shrine, a living 
Buddha, in the great new city throbbing with machinery. 

As I think of these three Palaces, and of what each has 
stood for in the mighty past, it seems to me that, in their 
recent history and their present fate, we have an epitome 
of the whole tragedy (for tragedy it is) of the violation 
by the West of the East's immemorial seclusion. Also 
these grim sermons in stone speak of the wisdom of Dai 
Nippon, the nation that put oil into its lamp and learned 
in time the Western way of man-killing by machinery. 

1 Originally pu]Dlished in Asia (New York). 
309 



310 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

For if the Forbidden Cities of Peking and Seoul are now 
open to the pubUc (on presentation of a card), is it not 
because their rulers and wise men honestly beUeved (Uke 
Mr. Wilson) that reason is superior to force and that 
violence is an argument fit only for malefactors ? Even 
after the wars of 1842 and i860, when the citizens of 
Peking had seen the hosts of the invaders encamped on 
the Anting plain and watched the smoke of the looted 
Summer Palace rising to Heaven, Japan alone of aU the 
Eastern nations took the lesson to heart and proceeded 
to put on the whole armour of materiahsm. China, 
panophed in the invincible superiority of her ancient 
reverences and beliefs, heard the legions thunder by and 
turned again to sleep. And to-day, when the Manchus' 
little day is done and the kingdom has been taken from 
them by reason of their impotence, the Dragon Throne 
at Peking remains empty because Japan has willed it 
so — ^to this the shade of Yuan Shih-k'ai bears witness at 
the Seven Springs. This Palace of Peking which, within 
the memory of man, has held the vassal East in fee, 
levying homage and tribute from Annam, Tibet, and 
Korea, and all the " lesser breeds without the law," is 
now little better than an appanage of Tokyo — Tokyo the 
once despised, whose worldly-wise rulers have stooped 
for years to conquer. Had there been no coming of the 
West, with its missionaries, modern artillery, and money 
to lend, the passing of the Manchus would have meant no 
more to the Middle Kingdom than a summer day's 
shower. But where, in all this wind-fed Republic, is the 
Man of Destiny who shall restore the glory that was 
once Cathay, who shall save the Great Inheritance from 
the hands of alien mortgagees ? 

It was all, of course, inevitable. In the bustling 
workaday world-of-things-as-they-are, there is no place for 
meditation, no room for the Canons of the Sages, or the 
dreamers of ancient dreams. Say what you will, the 
be-all and the end-all of the West in the East is trade, 
9,11-devouring trade, which has no traffic with philosophy, 



THREE PALACES 311 

For what more do they amount to, all our boasts of 
progress, all our labours for the advancement of Western 
civiUsation, than a claim to disturb the hves of a simple- 
hearted people with ideas which, being Oriental, they 
distrust, and with machinery which, being elemental, 
they dislike? It is our pleasure and our pride to move 
through life much faster and with far more noise than 
the Chinese have ever done or desired to do ; we have 
perfected mechanical devices by which, if we so choose, 
we can reduce them to slavery or the cemetery ; but do 
these things justify the West in claiming for its civilisa- 
tion, as compared with that of the East, any real 
superiority — any superiority, in fact, other than that 
which a soulless machine has over a man ? I think not. 
I believe that the feelings with which every one of us 
regards these splendid monuments of earth's most vener- 
able civilisation are evidence of the instinctive reverence 
which our triumphant materiaUsm pays to the intellectual 
and moral superiority of the East. For what shall it 
profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own 
soul ? And the soul of the East, deep-rooted in the 
philosophy of the Sages, keeps its own wise counsel, 
undismayed, though its high places be filled with the 
clamour of the barbarian. They have survived many 
invasions of barbarism, these passive sons of Han, but 
no ahen rule has ever changed their unperturbed attitude 
toward Ufe and death, their valuation of the things that 
matter. And so, though a gaudy five-coloured flag floats 
above the yellow roof where the Empress-Dowager 
reigned, majestic to the end, and though the rulers of 
the Republic are busy selling the remainder of their birth- 
right for whatever it may fetch, there is comfort of a 
kind to be found in these time-mellowed roofs and in 
the steadfast walls of Kublai Khan that gird the For- 
bidden City. 

Yes, there is comfort in the sight and thought of them, 
because they stand for the very soul of the East, for many 
beautiful and venerable things which wither and wane 



312 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

in our machine-made world; the dignity and grace of 
splendid ceremonial, of solemn rites conceived and carried 
out, through countless years, in a spirit of simple reverence 
which touches the sublime. I like to believe that the 
memory of these things, and the love of them, will remain 
as deep-rooted in the life of the Chinese people as ancestor- 
worship itself ; for is not the Throne, with all its stately 
ritual, the essential crown and climax of the Confucian 
philosophy? For a little while these men, who call 
themselves Republicans, may be lured from the Way of 
wisdom by fear, favour, or greed ; for a little while they 
may be content to see earth's most beautiful song without 
words, the Temple of Heaven, abandoned to sordid uses 
or neglect ; they may see fit to wear frock-coats and top 
hats, instead of the most dignified and decorative gar- 
ments ever devised by man ; but surely before long they 
— or others in their place — will be compelled to restore 
the ancient faith, the ancient ways. Is it not known to 
every tea-house in the North, that all the " big men " 
of the RepubUc, including the President himself, pledged 
themselves three years ago to restore the Dragon Throne 
and to set the boy Hsiian Tung upon it ? It is not 
possible that China's Older Statesmen, men Uke Hsii 
Shih-chang, Wu Ting-fang, and Liang Shih-yi, should be 
content for long to see the imperishable traditions of 
Cathay replaced by the antics and indignities of a horde 
of carpet-baggers and intellectual half-breeds. 

If they now suffer these indignities, it is because the 
present-day mandarins, like the Manchus, are an effemin- 
ate and timid breed ; one seeks in vain amongst them for 
one stout-hearted leader of the type of Tso Tsung-tang 
or Admiral Ting. They are afraid of the students, 
afraid of the soldiers, afraid of their own shadows ; above 
all, afraid of sudden tumults and alarms, which might 
mean the loss of their close-hoarded wealth. But the 
man and the hour will surely come ; and the world will 
then remember that it was by the will of the Emperor 
of China that the Republic came into being, and that 




PEKING : THE ENTRANCE TO A TA yJiN S RESIDENCE. 




IN THE ONCE -FORBIDDEN CITY, PEKING. 



THREE PALACES 313 

he who gives may take away. His Majesty Hsiian 
Tung, as a matter of historical fact, is still the Son 
of Heaven. As Emperor, he has decreed that the form 
of government in China shall be a " Constitutional 
Republic, to comfort the longing of all within the Empire 
and to act in harmony with the ancient Sages, who 
regarded the Throne as a public heritage." 

Go where you will in China, speak with all sorts and 
conditions of men, and everywhere they will tell you 
that under the sham Republic things have been much 
worse for the common people than ever they were under the 
Manchus. Even the hireling journalists, who have helped 
to nourish Young China's fantastic delusions and to en- 
courage their self-seeking ambitions, are beginning to 
admit that only the restoration of a strong Central 
Government, under such a constitutional monarchy as was 
proposed in 1898 by his unfortunate Majesty Kuang 
Hsii, can bring back order and prosperity to China. 

Wise men, like Sir Robert Hart, Prince Ito, and Yuan 
Shih-k'ai, knew this and predicted the anarchy that must 
follow the attempt to establish a Republic. And it was 
Yuan, past- master of Oriental statecraft, who, when the 
game was up in 1912, arranged for an " abdication " of 
the Emperor, under conditions that left him the Imperial 
title and his residence in the Imperial City, with a liberal 
pension and all the ceremonial and religious observances 
of his dynasty. In the profound seclusion of his palace, 
in sight of the Presidential Mansion, Hsiian Tung main- 
tains the unbroken continuity of ancient traditions and 
all the elaborate etiquette of his diminished court, at 
the same time keeping up dignified (and, in certain 
quarters, intimate) relations with the Republican author- 
ities. Every Chinese official fully appreciates the state- 
craft which has prompted this maintenance of the Throne 
behind the power, and of the deferential attitude which 
even the parliamentarians pay to His Majesty en retraite. 
And every shopkeeper of the capital keeps his Dragon 
flag carefully folded away, against the day when the 



314 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

Son of Heaven shall return in splendour to his Great 
Inheritance, 

Meanwhile, for good or evil, the West has left its mark 
upon and around the Forbidden City. They have cut 
great holes in the Chien M6n wall and the " stupid 
people " make free of the Via Sacra, the straight and 
royal road which runs from the heart of the Imperial 
enclosure to the Temple of Heaven. Cook's tourists, in 
motor-cars, now raise the dust in places where in former 
days no foreigner might pass. The picturesque old 
Peking cart and the palanquin have almost disappeared 
from the main Streets ; to-day, ministers of State and 
wealthy men drive in their limousines, where twenty 
years ago they sat behind fat Szechuan mules, protected 
from the mud in covered carts. You can even motor 
on a good metalled road to the Western Hills, by way of 
the Summer Palace; if rumour lie not, more than one 
dignitary of the new regime repairs thither for week-end 
joy-rides with Dulcinea-up-to-date. Thousands of jin- 
rickshas, pubhc and private, crowd the new thorough- 
fares; these, and Chu Chi-chien's stolid police, are 
conspicuous amongst the outward and visible signs of 
change. But the camel and the donkey still bear their 
modest share of the traffic, and the general appearance 
of the city, beyond the small area in which foreign-style 
houses have been built, is much the same as it was in the 
days of the Manchus. At dusk, in all the smaller hu- 
fung off the main streets, the shrill cries and pipings of 
innumerable hawkers and pedlars blend in an old-time 
evensong that seems to speak of lives deep-rooted in 
ancestral ways — a sort of vocal incense to the past. 

There are motor-cars also in Seoul, and if you are a 
distinguished visitor, you will be personally conducted 
and admitted to the precincts of that which, ten years 
ago, was the Palace of the Emperor of Korea, and most 
of which is now the area of the Government General 
Museum. They will show you, also, the present palace 



THREE PALACES 315 

of Prince Yi, with its audience-room marvellously furnished 
with priceless embroidered screens and German gas- 
stoves. Prince Yi, whose helpless Hermit Kingdom has 
been taken away from him, and replaced by a lieutenancy 
in the Japanese Army. But they have left him his 
beautiful palace pleasaunce, a very delectable retreat for 
any king in exile, with its classic pavilions and dainty 
summer-houses nestling in the heart of the wood, a 
spot most suitable either for meditating on the vanity 
of human ambitions or for sporting with Amaryllis in 
the shade. Sad but stately, very dignified in adversity, 
is this old Imperial city of Seoul, which its Japanese 
masters call Keijo. Its ancient palaces are very cousins 
to those of Peking, with their massive curved roofs and 
the huge lacquered pillars that remind one of the great 
cedars of Lebanon, with which Solomon builded the 
Temple. The large central Audience Hall, with the 
decaying water-garden behind it, stands open to the 
winds of heaven; the dust Hes thick upon its pillared 
terraces and painted ceilings. It looks out upon all the 
brand-new trappings with which Japan has decked the 
hill-girt city — ^the wide, paved roads, banks, hospitals 
and barracks, the railway and hotels. It looks out, too, 
upon the winding mountain way, by which for centuries 
the tribute-bearing envoys and their caravans started on 
the journey to Peking. And all about the Imperial 
enclosure are little clusters and aUey-ways of mean mud 
huts, the homes of old Korea, abjectly ineffective, yet 
possessed of that quality of philosophic dignity which 
distinguishes the humblest of these hewers of wood and 
drawers of water. It must look far back into the past, 
this palace of the Hermit Kingdom, to catch a glimpse 
of the days of Korea's pride of art and learning ; all its 
Hving memories are those of a people that has been con- 
tent with vassaldom, wiUing to pay tribute as the price 
of protection. The Land of the Morning Calm has paid 
for centuries the price of listless lotus-eating ; its empty, 
silent Audience Hall represents the last scene in a drama 



316 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

of inevitable destiny. But how many scenes of battle, 
murder, and sudden death have been enacted around and 
within these grim old walls, before " the shuttlecock 
among the nations " came to its pitiful end ? 

Because of the far-sighted statecraft of Prince Ito — 
who took the young Prince Yi as a boy of nine to be 
educated in Japan — ^the present rulers of Korea have 
gilded the pill of " assimilation " for him whose father 
was an Emperor. They have left him the outward and 
visible signs of semi-royal state and have given " face " 
to many of the old Korean nobihty — as useless a lot of 
hereditary wasters as ever battened on a miserable 
peasantry. They are marrying His Royal Highness to 
a daughter of the Japanese Prince Nashimoto, the idea 
being to set an example of harmonious fusion, and thus 
to counteract the agitation of the mission-taught students 
and other exponents of the principle of " self-determina- 
tion." One hears all sorts of stories about this strategic 
marriage. Very different is the tale they tell you in 
Seoul from that which you get at Tokyo. 

Most Japanese will tell you that, in giving Prince Yi 
one of the most beautiful and high-born ladies of Japan 
to wed, the Japanese Government is doing its best to 
atone for the errors and offences committed by the 
Mihtary Party in Korea; that the marriage is, in fact, 
part and parcel of the policy of conciliatory Liberalism, 
which aims at making the Koreans capable and con- 
tented citizens of the Empire, with equal rights and 
representation. They point to the fact that the ad- 
ministration of the country is now in the hands of pro- 
gressive and broad-minded civilians and that the condition 
of the people, infinitely better than ever it was under the 
old regime, is steadily improving; both of which facts 
are undeniable. When the Koreans get the measures of 
local self-government which have been promised them 
and full representation in the Imperial Diet, the cry of 
" self-determination " will have nothing behind it but the 
professional agitator and the mushy sentimentalist, who is 
always for the under-dog, no matter how he got there. 



THREE PALACES 817 

There are some very sympathetic sentimentalists in 
Seoul — missionaries, for the most part, who were un- 
official advisers of royalty in the old days, and elderly 
ladies, who regret the dead old Emperor and his comic- 
opera Court, " where every one was somebody, and no 
one anybody." These dear people wax very eloquent 
over Korea's lost independence, and pray for American 
intervention, but they forget that when Japan drove 
first China and then Russia from Korea, by force of 
arms, the whole business might have been in another 
planet, so far as the Koreans were concerned. Also, 
that America was all in sympathy with Japan at the 
time of her war with Russia, and President Roosevelt 
a strong supporter of her claim to paramount influence 
in Korea. 

But to return to the Prince's marriage. They will 
tell you in Seoul that he was betrothed in childhood to 
a Korean girl of noble family, and that to force him into 
another marriage was an act of barbarous tyranny. Also 
that his wedding to the Japanese Princess was to have 
taken place on the twenty-fifth of January, 1919, 
but that it had to be postponed because, a few days 
before the event, his father, the ex-Emperor, committed 
suicide, and the father of his native-bom betrothed did 
the same. It is quite possible that these stories are true ; 
but as the young Prince himself has been brought up in 
Japan since he was nine, and cannot possibly have any 
deep attachment for any Korean lady, it seems absurd 
to attempt to justify political agitation in this matter 
on sentimental grounds. Politically speaking, the best, 
in fact the only, solution of the Korean question lies in 
peaceful assimilation; and thus regarded, the marriage 
of Prince Yi to the Princess Nashimoto is evidently 
justifiable on grounds of expediency. If the ex-Emperor 
of Korea were of the type which commits suicide on a 
point of dignity or honour (which I doubt), the time for 
him to have done it, with real effect, was when the 
Japanese compelled him to sign the Treaty of Annexation 
in August 1910. What sense could there be in his 



318 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

objecting to the marriage of his son to a Japanese princess, 
after he had signed such a clause as this : " H.M. the 
Emperor of Japan and H.M. the Emperor of Korea, 
having in view the special and close relations between 
their respective countries, desiring to promote the com- 
mon weal of the two nations, and to assure permanent 
peace in the extreme East, and being convinced that these 
objects can best be attained by the annexation of Korea 
to the Empire of Japan, have resolved to conclude a treaty 
of such annexation " ? 

The pity 'tis, but true, that the Palace of the Kings of 
Korea is not likely ever again to be anything but a 
melancholy monument to the departed greatness, the 
splendid isolation, of the East ; a spot where tourists may 
moralise, very comfortably, on the destinies of nations 
and the presence of flies in the ointment of self-determina- 
tion. The doom of its independent Throne was sealed 
when the restless Powers of the West, seeking new worlds 
to conquer, sent their first heralds, with battleships and 
Bibles, to bid the East awake and gird itself to trade. 
And if it be true that a live dog is better than a dead lion, 
then the destiny of His Highness Prince Yi is more for- 
tunate than that of most of his ancestors ; for history 
shows that the Koreans, like the Japanese, have shown 
but little respect for their monarchs and suffered very few 
of them to die covered with years and honour. 

Now, from the palaces of monarchs dethroned, let us 
turn to that which to me is more beautiful, and in some 
ways more interesting than either, the Palace of his 
Sacrosanct Majesty, the Mikado of Japan. Indeed, I 
know of no spot on earth which carries the same appeal to 
the imagination and the historic sense, as this medieval 
enclosure of the Chiyoda Palace, with its triple moats and 
majestic, cedar-crowned walls, at the very heart of the 
modernised city of Tokyo. It is as if the spirit of the 
ancient East werehereinvulnerably entrenched, a treasure- 
house and stronghold of Asian mystery, protected by 



THREE PALACES 319 

invisible hands against a world of impious change. Far 
more profound than the aloofness of Peking's Forbidden 
City under the Manchus, is the mystic seclusion with 
which the makers of modern Japan have surrounded " the 
descendant of Jimmu Tenno, who was the grandson of the 
Sun Goddess, who can do no wrong." 

These moats and walls tell their own story of the old 
feudal days and of the Tokugawa Shogunate, that held the 
Dragon Throne in custody. To the passer-by, the voice of 
the wind in these cedars sings brave tales of old Japan, 
of chivalry and beauty and romance, like to the tales of 
the minstrels at the Kabuki Theatre, beloved of the 
people. But to him who understands, they sing also of 
Elder Statesmen and of the craft of king-making. For 
this semi-divinity, with which the Clansmen, who rule 
Japan, have seen fit to invest their Sovereign since the 
Restoration of 1868, this Emperor-worship, which in fifty 
years has taken so firm a hold upon the masses, is un- 
doubtedly part and parcel of a skilful official propaganda 
of Imperialism. Prince Ito and the Elder Statesmen, 
who brought their country safely through many perils, 
reahsed that they must devise a new rallying-point for 
loyalty and patriotism, and they found it in Mikadoism, 
Emperor worship, the dominating force of modern Japan. 
The bureaucracy of the Clans has exalted Mikadoism and 
made it a popular religion, with very definite political 
ends in view, chief of which is, that the mystic oracle 
shall always express itself as the Clans think fit. When 
a Minister of State proclaims " that the majesty of our 
Imperial House towers high above everything to be found 
in the world, as durable as heaven and earth," he pro- 
claims also, for all who have ears to hear, the fact that 
those who, as delegates of the Throne, represent its 
omniscience, can do no wrong. And so this Chiyoda 
Palace, this lovely dream enshrined in rough-hewn stone, 
stands firm amidst a world of change, a splendid casket 
for the mystic Throne, worshipped from afar. In its 
precincts inviolate dwells the Sacred Presence which sits 



320 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

upon that Throne, he who reigns but does not rule, the 
consecrated puppet of Mikadoism; and all about these 
grim old walls, close to the moat and glacis slopes, where 
the wild duck sleep in the sun, the life of modern Tokyo 
storms and frets, with its noisy hooting of motor-horns 
and rumbling of heavy-laden trams. Within sight of 
its guard-towers and bastions are the Western-style build- 
ings of the Diet, all the Government offices, hotels, and 
banks of the new dispensation, and the pretentious 
villas of the new plutocracy. But from its silent and 
mysterious depths, as from a Delphic oracle, still issue the 
Imperial Rescrip;ts before which the Diet bows its head 
and the voice of the people is stilled, those ordinances 
in which the will of the Elder Statesmen cloaks itself 
in the sanctity of the Imperial Ancestors. To make and 
to keep these Edicts majestically impressive, to maintain 
their authority as a power above that of the law, the 
Clansmen in their wisdom have always surrounded this 
shrine of the national Deity with an atmosphere of impene- 
trable mystery, and kept its sanctuary inviolate. They 
know that, shorn of its mysteries, Mikadoism as a religion 
and an incentive to patriotism would lose most of its 
appeal to the masses. 

Therefore, in spite of the enterprising activity of the 
Japanese Press and the natural curiosity of the diplomatic 
world in Tokyo, very little is known of the daily life of 
the Inner Court at the Chiyoda Palace. A small book 
pubhshed in 1912, The Memoirs of a Lady-in-Waiting, 
gave an interesting description of the rigid etiquette 
imposed on all who live, move, and have their being near 
the Presence; but it was promptly suppressed as lese 
majeste by the ever- vigilant authorities. Since then 
several newspapers have been punished by the police for 
attempting to throw hght on the manners and customs 
of the Court. 

But enough has been told, by the " Lady-in-Waiting " 
and by others, to show that Hfe in the Inner Court of 
the Chiyoda Palace bears a remarkable resemblance to 



THREE PALACES 321 

that of the old Court of China. The amusements, accom- 
phshments, and religious observances of the Court ladies 
are in many ways curiously Hke those of the Forbidden 
City in Peking under the Empress- Dowager, as described 
by the Princess Derling. All these ladies are the 
daughters of the old Kuge, or court nobles, of Kyoto, 
and they maintain in the life of the Palace not only the 
Kyoto dialect, but all the old-world, dreamy atmosphere 
of that ancient centre of Japanese culture and religion, 
as impervious to the influence of Western civilisation as 
the Dalai Lama or the Grand Mogul. With the exception 
of a few youths, who act as pages and messengers between 
the Outer and the Inner Courts, society within the sacred 
precincts consists entirely of women. In former days 
His Majesty was entitled to twelve lawful wives and con- 
cubines, a discretion, but since the passing of the Imperial 
House Law in 1889, the Empress is his only lawful spouse. 
The pohtical influence wielded by many of the Court 
ladies, and especially by the first lady-in-waiting (mother 
of the present Emperor), bears a certain resemblance 
to that which the eunuchs wielded under the later 
Manchus at the Court of Peking. As in the case of the 
eunuchs, their hot -house lives have always been closely 
confined within the Palace walls, their knowledge of the 
outside world has been practically nil, and their minds, 
therefore, naturally prone to constant intriguing for 
power and rights of patronage against the Chamberlains 
and Ministers of the Household. And behind the thirty 
ladies-in-waiting, there are the rank and file of female 
Palace attendants, some three hundred, all of Kyoto 
stock — quite sufficient to keep any conscientious Chamber- 
lain on the qui vive. 

The education of the present Emperor was taken out 
of the hands of the Palace Ladies by his father, when he 
was eight years old and entrusted to Count Hijikata, 
a Minister who had long been the avowed enemy of petti- 
coat influence and who had fought several losing battles 
with the veteran Lady Takahira, far famed for her ready 

Y 



322 CHINA, JAPAN, AND KOREA 

tongue. The present Emperor and his consort are thus, 
by education, much less rigidly conservative in many 
ways than His Late Majesty Mutsuhito. Nevertheless, 
the Inner Court remains strictly native in its architecture, 
equipment, and ways of life, a little oasis of old Japan, 
serenely undisturbed by the bustle of Western civihsa- 
tion, faithful to the teachings and traditions of the past. 
I like to think that this kernel of conservatism at the 
very heart of Japan's national life, this little stronghold of 
stability amidst tempestuous seas of modern materiahsm, 
represents something of instinctive wisdom, something 
more than political expediency, on the part of the Elder 
Statesmen. I like to think of this moated Palace as the 
outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace, 
as a symbol of the steadfast soul of the East, a sign that 
it is destined to endure, untarnished and unchanged, long 
after Europe has forgotten most of its present-day inven- 
tions. From the noisy tram-cars, and crowds uncouthly 
clad in hideous alien clothes, I look gratefully towards 
those cedar-crowned walls, and, with the eye of faith, 
I see the Soul of the East emerging once again, trium- 
phantly serene, as it has so often done before, from 
perils of change. In this vision, the Three Palaces speak 
with one voice, but that of Tokyo strikes a more hopeful 
note than either Peking or Seoul, because of the virile 
energy of the Japanese people, which has enabled them to 
wrest from the armouries and laboratories of the West the 
secrets of its material strength, and at the same time to 
preserve their reverence for the deep-rooted wisdom, the 
immemorial usage, of the East. In this, my vision, the 
East comes once more into its own, and I descry, ages 
hence, a Confucianist Sage pondering, like Macaulay's 
New Zealander amidst the ruins of London, on the rise 
and fall of a material civilisation in which there was no 
place for philosophy. 



INDEX 



Addis, Sir Charles, 127 

Agriculture, 150, 204, 227 

Ahn Chang-ho, 201 

American opinion, i, 4, 5, 6, 10, 

20, 78, 89, 272, 284, 299 
Americanised Chinese, 70, 81 
Ancestor-worship, 42, 82, 312 
Anfu clique, 22, 62, 92, 97, 100, 

108, 112, 285 
Anglo-American interests, 121, 

134, 155, 158, 165, 168, 169, 189, 

256 
Anglo-Japanese Alliance, 133, 156, 

160, 162, 163, 169, 175, x8o, 191 
Anti-British Press, 172 
Anti-Opium Association, 106 
Asian Review, 69, 164, 188 
Australia, 142, 154, 156 

Balance of power, 135, 154 

Banks, 15, 26, 52, 66, 76, 87, 105, 
121, 140, 148, 164, 188, 241, 
269, 283, 289 

Bean trade, 106 

Bell, E. P., 192 

Benevolent despotism, 107 

Black Dragon, 165, 190 

Borrowing, by Chinese Govern- 
ment, 66, 83, 86, 94, 106, 121, 

125 
Boxer indemnity, 54, 64, 87, 279, 

283, 293, 302 
Brigandage, 15, 16, 39, 55, 71, 

106, 120 
Buddhist doctrine, 33, 85 
Burma, 168 

California, 210, 211, 213, 262 

Canada, 154 

Cantonese, 17, 22, 52, 68, 70, 89, 

91, 92, 98, 108, 212, 257, 301 
Cecil, Lord Robert, 252 
Central Government, 22, 29, 32, 

52, 66, 80, 95, 109, 119, 121, 129 
Chang Chih-Tung, 275 
Chang Hsun, 13, 57, 59, 76, 109, 

120, 269, 297, 298 
Y 2 323 



Chang Tso-lin, 97, 102, 107, 109, 
no, 270, 290 

Chen Chin-tao, 72 

Cheng, S. G., 25, 78, 92 

Chihli Viceroyalty, 52, 61, 97, 
107, 108, 119, 163, 287 

Chinese bonds, 91, 132 

Chinese character : fidelity, 249 ; 
greed for money, 74, 8x ; 
illiterate masses, 81 ; lovable, 
68 ; moral philosophy, 245 ; 
race-mind, 41, 104, 294; 
timidity, 76, 122, 264, 282 

Chinese Labour, 137, 256 

Chinese Republic : attitude to 
Emperor, 298; established, i, 
30 ; Press enthusiasm, 7 ; Pro- 
visional Constitution, 52 ; Young 
China's leaders, 74 

Chiyoda Palace, 318 

Choshiu Clan, 161, 181, 190' 

Chou-An-hui Society, 44 

Christianity^ 194^ 213, 219, 247 

Chu Chi-chien, 122 

Chiieh tajen, 270, 274 

Civil War in China, 17, 22, 28, 80, 
88, 89, 112, 118 

Coleman, Frederick, 162, 199 

Confucianism, 30, 34, 49, yj, 81, 
84, 91, 108, 282, 299, 301, 312 

Consortium, 66, 87, 106, 108, 113, 
117, 125, 128, 160, 168 

Cost of living, 139, 142, 177, 226 

Coup d'etat, Old Buddha's, 33 

Cromer, Earl, 8, 9 

Currency reform, 128, 132 

Customs' revenues (China), 54, 64, 
75, 86, 91, 98, 129, 170 

Dai Nippon, 132, 143, 214, 229 
Democratic ideals, 10, 11, 17, 18, 

27, 73, 180, 261 
Dewey, Professor, 19 
Disbandment of Chinese troops, 

117, 123, 127 
Dragon Throne, 34, 43, 60, 73, 82, 

91, no, 279, 295, 299, 310, 312 



324 



INDEX 



East and West, 85, 210, 246, 276, 

294. 309 

Emigration, 141, 152, 158 

Emperor Hsiian Tung : in wait- 
ing, 295; Dragon Throne, 299; 
deference, 303 ; exercise, 307 ; 
guardians, 299; his English 
tutor, 300; maintenance, 305, 
marriage question, 296, 305 

Empress Dowager Tzu-Hsi, 61, 
104, 282, 304, 311, 321 

European War, 47, 53, 55, 60, 68, 
160, 169, 179 

Family system, 83, 176, 182, 184 
Famines, Chinese, 14, 15, 18, 20, 

27. 83, 94. 109, i;o, 263 
Feng Kuo-chang, 49, 57, 62, 63, 

79. 285 
Fengtien, 163 

Foreign financial control in China, 
necessity for, 10, 27, 28, 69, 76, 

80, 83, 85, 98, 107, 117, 121, 
169, 230 

Frontier Defence Corps, 109 

" Geisha," 147, 236, 243 

Germany : activities of agents, 
66; declaration of war by 
China, 64, 65; expulsion from 
Kiao-chao, 44; German club, 
102; intrigues, 44, 53, 130; 
Japan's claims, 270; Liaotung, 
203; Old Consortium, 126; 
privileges in Shantung, 173; 
propagandists, 188, 206; sub- 
sidised Press, 54 

Hanihara, 166 

Hara, Prime Minister, 174 

Hart, Sir Robert, 107, 313 

Hayashi, Baron, 152, 164, 170, 180 

Hijikata, Count, 321 

Hong Kong, 150, 257 

Hsiian Tung, 61. See Emperor. 

Hsii Shih-chang, 57, 109, 304, 312 

Hua Chuen-mei, 5 

Huang Hsing, 4 

Ijuin, 173 

Inouye, 178, 188, 218 
Ishii, Baron, 152, 164, 168, 188 
Ito, Prince, 115, 146, 178, 190, 
313, 316, 319 

Japan : Anglo-Japanese Entente, 
175; anti- Japanese demonstra- 
tion, 79 ; ascendancy at Peking, 



25, 80, 97, no; Asian Review, 
164; Black Dragons, 166, 190; 
claims to racial equality, 143 ; 
clothes, 218, 223, 228 ; conflicting 
instincts, 1 80 ; Consortium, 134, 
135; conviction that Germany 
would win the War, 160, 169, 
179; cost of living, 139, 142, 
177; dream of Pan- Asian 
Empire, 190; emigration, 141, 
144, 210; family system, 176, 
182, 184; fear of moral isola- 
tion, 189; food supply and 
population, 137, 141, 146, 169; 
future development, 154; 
"Geisha," 147, 236, 243; 
honesty in commerce, 188; 
increasing dislike to foreigners, 
186; Jingo element, 113, 144, 
164, 168; Kiaochao, 171; 
Liberalism, 113, 179; liners, 
209, 216, 219 ; military prestige, 
181; music, 215, 238; naval 
programme, 191 ; not a colon- 
ising race, 147; "Old Japan," 
218, 231, 237, 319; present 
policy, 113, 152; "peaceful 
penetration" in Korea, 149, 
197; profiteering, 139, 177, 216; 
progress in Manchuria and 
Mongolia, 149, 150; raw 
materials, sources of, 154, 161, 
168; ricefields and labour, 138, 
140; secret agreements with 
China, 133, 160, 162, 174, 180; 
social and political unrest, 177; 
suffrage and Labour Unions, 
183; suicides, 214; theatre, 
230 ; ultimatum to China, 45 ; 
Yangtsze Valley, 172 

Johnson, R. F., Emperor's tutor, 
288 

Jordan, Sir John, 263 

Kang Yu-wei, 303 

Kato, Viscount, 152, 162, 166 

Kawakami, 145, 171, 212 

Kenseikai, 180, 182 

Kiangsu Tuchun, Li Shun, no 

Kiaochao, 170, 271 

Komura, Viscount, 166 

Korea : alternative to Japanese 
rule, 207 ; character, 242 ; com- 
pared to Ireland, 242 ; Declara- 
tion of Independence, 194; 
" geographical gravitation," 
142; II Chin Hoi, 198; in- 
capacity for self-government, 



INDEX 



325 



199; influence of missionaries; 
193; Japan's position, 204; 
President Roosevelt's view, 177 ; 
self-determination, 170, 186, 
Seoul, 240 ; spirit of nation- 
alism, 200; standard of living, 
207 ; sufferings and humiliations, 
195 ; United States' attitude, 193 

Kuang Hsii, Emperor, 303 

Kuangtung, 108 

Kuo-Min tang, 32, 33, 36, 43, 52, 
58, 59, 65 

Labour, Chinese, 137, 256 

Lafcadio Hearn, 177 

Lamont, T. W., 126, 193 

Lansing, 152 

League of Nations, 136, 179, 192, 

193, 197, 198, 199, 202, 252 
Liang Ch'i-ch'ao, 47, 60 
Liang Shih-5'i, 292, 312 
Liaotung, 164, 203 
Li Ching-hsi, 59, 61 
Li Ching-mai, 301 
Li Hung Chang, 32, 46, 58, 97, 

104, 301 
Li Shun, no 
Li Ting-hsin, 52 
Li Yuan-hung, 50, 57, 63 
Little Hsii, 102, 107, 108, 119 
Lu Tsung-ju, 108 
Lu Yung-ting, 72, 108 

Ma Liang, 274, 275 

Manchu dynasty : abdication, i ; 
abortive restoration, 11, 43, 56, 
269; Chang Hsiin's mediation, 
60 ; collapse, 3, 281 ; Hsuan Tung, 
61 ; maintenance of Emperor, 
297 ; never definitely abdicated, 
297, 313; pensioners, 306; 
" Worship of Heaven," 38 

Manchuria, 46, 80, loi, 105, 106, 

126, 133, 141, 143, 147, 149, 154, 
158, 167, 173, 270, 291 

Mandarin class, 12, 18, 25, 34, 
45, 51, 83, 87, 95, no, 116, 122, 
130, 173, 268, 2S2, 301, 312 

Mandarin wealth restricted, 94 

McKenzie, F. A., 194 

Midzuno, Dr., 198 

Mikado, 318 

Missionaries, 14, 15, 20, 30, 78, 

127, 132, 193, 247, 255, 291, 317 
Mitsu-bishi, 184 

Monarchy in China, 32, 33, 47 
Mongolia, 105, 126, 133, 141, 150, 
158, 167 



Morrison, Dr., 6, 7, 8 
Mu Yung-hsien, 72 

Nashimoto, Prince, 316 
National Assembly (Chinese), 31, 

37 
National Convention, 13, 108, 

III 
" New Parliament," 22 
Nieh, General, 57 
Northern Militarists, 24 

Obata, 173 

Okuma Government, 44, 144, 188 

" Old Japan," 231, 237, 319 

" Old Parliament," China, 22, 23 

Opium, 16, 17, 78, 105, 106, 131, 

261, 274, 290 
Ozaki, 152, 164, 180 

Pan-Asian Empire, 190 
Pan-Pacific Association, 21 
Parliament, 11, 17, 22, 23, 26, 37 

41, 50, 52, 56, 261 
Peace Conference, 45, 102, 105, 

III, 123, 144 
Peking : Confucian tradition, 282 ; 
hoarding habit, 289; immuta- 
bility and modernity, 279 ; isola- 
tion, 240 ; Japanese ascendancy, 
25, 80, 97, no; Obata, 173; 
official clique, 79; opium, 290; 
palace, 309, 318; sanctuary for 
millionaires, 284, 288; students' 
strike, 283 ; trade and traffic, 
285; Y.M.C.A., 284 
Police, 286 
Population, 19, 220 
Postal service, 75, 170, 292 
Presidential election law, 41 
" Procreative recklessness," 19, 

27, 82, 248 
Provisional Constitution, 52 

Race-mind, 41, 104 

" Racial discrimination," 170, 188 

Racial equality, 210 

Railways, 87, 105, 120, 126, 128, 

130, 155, 161, 169, 172, 254, 

268, 274 
Reconstruction, 28, 75, 85, 113 
Reinsch, Dr. Paul, 8, 21, 22 
Religious beliefs, 27, 30, 55, 85 
Revolution, Chinese, of 191 1, i, 2, 

107, 112, 115, 277 
Rice trade, 106, 137 
Roosevelt, President, 193, 197, 

317 



326 



INDEX 



Russia, 12, 46, 64, 75, 97, 135, 
143, 153, 155, 167, 169, 186, 191, 
193, ig8, 203, 211, 240, 317 

Saionji, Marquis, 145, 188 

Salt Gabelle, 53, 66, 75, 87, 98, 

125, 131, 287 
Satsuma and Choshiu Clans, 161, 

181, 190 
Sei5nikai Party, 175 
Self-determination, 192, 240 
Self-government, i, 31, 71 
Seoul, 240, 310, 314 
Shanghai, 90, 173, 245, 250, 252, 

253, 255, 258, 259, 263, 264, 

272, 273 
Shantung, 79, 81, too, 119, 135, 

151, 169, 173, 267, 275, 285 
Sherrill, C. H., 194 
Shibusawa, Baron, 166 
Shih Hsii, 302 
Siam, 168 

Siberia, 141, 157, 162, 194 
Silver currency, 86, 287 
" Son of Heaven," 60, 82, 96, 296, 

300 
Southern constitutionalists, 24 
Soyeda, 166 
Students' Movement in China, 26, 

30, 69, 76, 78, 79, 82, 108, III, 
114, 177, 184, 254, 282, 284 

Suffrage, 31, 227, 263 

Sun Yat-sen, 4, 5, 8, 10, 11, 14, 21, 

31, 32, 43, 48, 57, 59> 65, 70, 
72, 73, 78, 116, 204, 262 

Sung Chiao-jen, 35 

Tainanfu, 286 

Taiping Rebellion, 85, 129, 252, 

273 

Tanaka, 164, 181 

Tang Shao-yi, 52, 57, 70, 77, 80, 
90, 94, 99, 100, 103, 150 

" Temple of Heaven," 40, 60, 305, 
312 

Terauchi, Count, 159 

Terrorism in Korea, 195 

Theatre, Japanese, 230 

Thibet, 168 

Ting, Admiral, 312 

Tokonami, 166 

Tokyo : art and religion, 228 ; 
democracy, 222 ; high cost of 
living, 225 ; Houses of Parlia- 
ment, 222 ; Imperial Palace, 
306; Kabuki Theatre, 230; 
population, 220; postal service, 
225; revolutionary ideas, 227; 



Rice Riots, 225 ; state of streets, 

224 
Tsai Ao, 49 

Tsao Ju-lin, 76, 108, 282 
Tsao Kun, 97, 102, 107, 109, no 
Tsen Chun-hsuan, 72, 90 
Tsinanfu, 270, 275, 286 
Tsingtao, 171 
Tso Tsung-tang, 312 
Tuan Chi-jui, 13, 50, 51, 52, 54, 

56, 58, 59, 61, 79, 92, 96, 97, 

99, 108, no. III, 119, 163, 

277 

Tuchuns : amassing of fortunes, 

74, 93 ; appeal to patriotism 

useless, 94; Chang Tso-lin, 



super-Tuchun, 104 ; descen- 

of mandarin Viceroys, 

91 ; diminished power of 



smaller Tuchuns, 109; dis- 
bandment of troops, 117, 123, 
127; hopeless misrule, 106; 
law unto themselves, 87, 96, 
114; Li Shun's bequest, no; 
matrimonial alliance between 
Chang Tso-lin and Tsao Kun, 
no; methods in Manchuria, 
105 ; payment of troops, 103 

Tung Chih, 302 

" Twenty-One Demands," the, 

172, 173 
Tyau, Dr., 25 
Tzu-Hsi, Empress-Dowager, 61, 

104, 282, 304, 311, 321 

Uchida, Viscount, 157, 159, 168 

Versailles Treaty, 76, 142, 143, 
170, 186, 197, 304 

Wang, C. T., 25, 74, 77, 116, 262, 

271 
Wang Huai-ching, 109 
Wang I-tang, 99, 102 
War Participation Loan, 100 
Weale, Putnam, n 
Wellington Koo, 25, 70, 77, 116 
Wen Tsung-yao, 72 
Western learning, 24, 26, 28, 36, 

69, 73, 77, 81, 115, 201, 249, 

262, 284, 294, 299, 304 
Wilson, President, 143, 170, 179, 

196, 252, 292 
Winter Solstice sacrifice, 40 
" Worship of Heaven," 38 
Wu Pei-fu, 13, 107, 108 
Wu Ting-fang, 70, 77, 80, 90, 

312 



INDEX 



827 



Yamagata, Prince, i6i, 174, 181 

Yang I-te, 284 

Yellow Peril, 10, 136, 211, 256 

Yi, Prince, 241, 315 

Yokohama, 251 

Yoshiwara, 171 

Yoshizawa, 166 

Young China : activities in the 
Press, 39, 88, 91, 107, 259; 
delusions, 313; intimidation, 
264 ; missionary encourage- 
ment, 78 ; new generation, 73 ; 
Utopianism, 261 ; vision of 
millennium, 31 ; Western con- 
ceptions, 115; Yuan Shih-k'ai 
and, 33 



Young Turks, 29 

Yuan Shih-k'ai : accepts Presi- 
dency, 29; American view of, 
4, 5, 11; attempt to restore 
monarchy, 43 ; attitude towards 
Japanese claims, 45, 46; char- 
acter, 34 ; Cromwellian methods, 
277; compared to Diaz, 19; 
denounced as traitor, 50 ; dicta- 
torial powers, 42, 119; forsaken 
by Tang Shao-yi, 95; Imperial 
aspirations, 49; last of super- 
mandarins, 51 ; paternal despot- 
ism, 27; policy, 37, 39, 40; 
recalled by Manchus, 29 ; signing 
of mandates, 39 



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